


various storms and saints

by elliptical



Series: to own a galaxy [5]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sgrub Session, Alternate Universe - Successful Rebellion, Disturbing Themes, Gen, Past Abuse, Torture, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-06
Updated: 2016-02-27
Packaged: 2018-05-05 07:44:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 33,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5366990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elliptical/pseuds/elliptical
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Feferi Peixes has won her challenge to become Empress and ascended the Alternian throne.<br/>Sollux Captor is missing.<br/>Karkat Vantas is determined to find him.<br/>And the newly-freed Helmsman just wants a goddamn break.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> right, i said i wasn't going to do multi-chapter fics in this series, but this fic is becoming a monster of a word count, so i'm breaking it up. all the writing done so far has been while crying to this song, yay
> 
>  
> 
> _you saw the stars out in front of you too tempting not to touch_  
>  _but though it shocked you something's electric in your blood_  
>  _and people just untie themselves, uncurling lifelines_  
>  _if you could just forgive yourself -_  
>  _but still you stumble, feet give way_  
>  _outside the world seems a violent place_  
>  _but you had to have him and so you did_  
>  _some things you have to let go in order to live_  
>  _-various storms and saints, florence and the machine_

Your name is Karkat Vantas. You are experiencing the dawn of a brave new world, you don't have to worry about being murdered for your blood color for the first time in your life, there are too many responsibilities on your shoulders, and everything is a waking day terror.

You have never been qualified for your current place in this world, genetics or not. Your wigglerhood was made of fear and hiding and violence, even while your instincts always propelled you to run before they told you to fight back. You're skilled enough in combat because you have to be, because somewhere between six and seven sweeps the switch flipped and you realized you needed to make yourself competent if you wanted to survive. There are pieces of you that are so cold you're not sure they'll ever unfreeze, and you're not sure you'll ever be able to stop running.

And yet here you are. Destiny and all. Your ancestor led a failed revolution and prophesized your existence, which means a lot of people seem to expect shit from you. Backing the Empress as the savior of lowbloods, enacting change, being the voice of the people. You're not about to pass up the opportunity to fix some of the fucked up shit in this world, especially considering Feferi is your friend and has good ideas and wants to help - but the weight of the responsibility is almost crushing. You weren't raised for this. You don't have any fucking clue what you're doing, aside from ancient texts and proverbs handed down over thousands of sweeps.

_I am no more loving or empathetic than the rest of trollkind. I am not an outlier. The violence present in the rest of our race has always been present in me, but so has the love - this way of life is about choices. Choosing to show mercy and kindness, choosing to be open and warm, choosing to trust rather than cower in fear. The paths we walk are all full of choices. Anyone can choose to strike down their neighbor, and anyone can choose to help them up instead. Sometimes under the weight of oppression, choices are all we have. And acts of kindness in the face of terror are acts of immense courage, not weakness._

Words that got your ancestor tortured to death - you're not a hundred percent confident the guy wasn't panrotted. But it's... it's a philosophy you can get behind, you think. At least choices mean control, rather than neverending existential terror and nihilism. You just wish there were less people watching the ones you make. You've always been too good at mistakes.

\---

You've been traveling from colony to colony on a combination of auxiliary power and volunteer psionics, but even then the travel isn't fast enough to please you. Still, Feferi anticipated that, so she has her most important advisors on the ship itself. This is going to be your hive for the next few sweeps, until she finishes her tour of the galaxy and stabilizes the Empire and lays out the blueprints for her own ship, so you might as well get shit done while you're here. Otherwise the world might dissolve into chaos and anarchy.

Of all the colonies you've visited so far, though, this one is your favorite. Most of the indigenous life on the planet was wiped out centuries ago, but the architecture the dominant species created is still there, sprawling cities that span miles above and below the earth. They never achieved interstellar flight because they decided to explore down instead of up first, and they had a rich cultural history based around written word, but you don't know much more about them than that. Their language, traditions, writing - it's all been lost over the sweeps.

That's pretty high on the long list of Things You Don't Have Time To Be Sad About But Are Inexplicably Sad About Anyway Because You Have A Broken Pity Gland Which Is Apparently A Genetic Inevitability: The Life The Movie The Blog.

Anyway. The place has been tapped out of its natural resources, so it's been cultivated as a research and preservationist colony for as long as anyone can remember. Genocide and mass cullings aside, the last Empress did seem to care about the survival or Alternian culture as she made it, which means the cities are massive libraries with all the material you can think of. The small open spaces within and outside the walls are full of flora that couldn't survive on your own planet once you fucked up its atmosphere to hell and back, specimens saved in labs until they could be transferred to a planet with a similar climate.

You expected the information housed here to be heavily censored, but it's not. The organization impresses you in a way that makes you think the Empress probably had very little to do with it. Everything from uprisings to ancient law to modern law to biology to physics to religion to fiction spanning every genre you can think of - you can find copies of original texts everywhere here, even ones critical of the Empire. (There's a whole section for cullable offense books. The authors were all horribly murdered, but their work lived on in a forgotten niche of Empire research, so... good for them?)

The easy access to unfettered information is also the reason travel here is more heavily regulated than to the more violent colonies. Since the violent animals have died out and the whole planet is a haven for nerds, the actual environment is more peaceful than any other you've seen. This place was used for researching and developing weapons of mass destruction, new tools of oppression and slavery - you're not blind to the structural violence it was created for. But no one's killing each other in the hallways or fighting for their lives in the streets.

Feferi wants to find out what kind of information is stored here before she opens the colony to the general public. It... makes sense, to be sure that no awful secrets or weapons could end up in the wrong hands, but there's still a prickle of discomfort in your chest.

Right now you're in search of the Helmsman, who isn't a fan of anything Feferi does, which means you have to be the bridge between them. Add to the growing list of Responsibilities You Never Asked For But Are Apparently Most Qualified For Thanks Once Again To Genetics. His hatred of her is exactly what makes him a good voice of reason, a strong adviser to have around, but it does not always make life easy.

At the very least, it's not hard to find him. He still has an Imperial tracker implanted behind his ear from when he was first installed into the helmscolumn. You're not sure he knows about it, and you really don't want to bring it up, because if he doesn't know you doubt he'll be pleased. He's flighty (hah) enough that taking it out would be a terrible idea (another twinge of discomfort in your chest, but if he runs off and gets confused and dies when the sun comes up then you're the one who's going to get shit for it).

He's sitting in the Imperial Garden, fingers curled around the armrest of the bench, surrounded by bushes overflowing with light season blooms. The garden itself is a maze of flowers and trees and shrubs that you never saw on Alternia, plants you can't quite believe ever grew there. He breathes quietly, eyes illuminating the darkness of the night, and you pad over to sit beside him.

"Hey," you say.

He hums.

"There was a meeting earlier. Just touching base with Feferi and her other advisers, talking about the trajectory of the reformations. Did you forget?"

"No." He shifts, folding his legs under himself in a way that makes you wonder how the fuck he retained any flexibility in the helmscolumn. "I just didn't want to go."

"It was boring. Nothing really new coming to light, just some arguing. Not even entertaining arguing. They were all squabbling amongst themselves over the most irrelevant shit, I didn't even get to yell at people. Total waste of an evening as far as I'm concerned."

"Mmm."

You sit in silence for a few minutes, because you can't decide what to add. The Helmsman saves you the trouble of needing to continue the conversation by saying, "I'm staying here."

"Okay? I wasn't going to tell you to come in yet?"

"No. I'm staying here, on the colony. When the ship leaves. I'm staying. I'll make arrangements for a place to sleep. The rest doesn't matter much."

You breathe out slowly through your nose.

"If the Empress needs me," he adds, "I'll be available to contact. She doesn't need to see me in person to hear my opinions. It would be logical to keep one of her advisers here, given the information here that's not readily available on the public or private networks. I'm good at research. I'm staying here."

"Have you told Feferi yet?" you ask.

He smiles, his gaze still unfocused and trained on the bushes rather than turned toward you. "No. But it's an interesting paradox, isn't it? She wants me to teach her how to keep from becoming her ancestor. I suppose she could imprison and enslave me on her ship to ensure I keep doing that, but if she does then there's nothing I can teach her."

You're silent again. There's not a lot to say. You can't blame him for wanting to stay here, and you certainly can't blame him for wanting to stay away from Feferi. And you. You can't blame him for staying away from you.

"What are you thinking?" he prompts when you don't answer.

You shrug. "I think it's fair for you to stay."

"Do you think your Empress will think the same?"

"If we lay out the case convincingly, sure."

His smile tightens around the edges. "And if I didn't have a case? If I didn't want to advise her or do research? If I just wanted to stay here and wait out my death without serving the Empire?"

"I'd still think that's fair."

"But the Empress wouldn't."

You stare down at your hands and try as you might, you can't help the irritated little huff of air that escapes you. "I don't know. I don't speak for her. I don't understand why you keep trying to push her to be someone she isn't, anyway. It's like you're searching for evidence that none of this will work so that you can make yourself feel better about your own shitty worldview, and it's fucking manipulative."

He laughs, but the tightness of his smile edges into the sound. "Wanting to rest is manipulative, little one?"

"When you stage it like a mind game, yeah."

"It doesn't need to be a mind game. It's a choice. She could make it very easily. All she needs to do is say I can stay."

Your hands are starting to shake the way they always do when you get stressed. You control your breathing and lean against the back of the bench, looking up at the stars since you can't stand to watch him any longer.

"You know things aren't always that easy," you say. "She has to weigh her options. She'll let you go anyway, because she's not fucking horrible regardless of what you want to believe, but you can't act like things are that easy."

The thin layer of static in the air intensifies, crackles. His fingers curl harder around the armrest. "Sometimes, little one," he says, a faux lightness to his tone, "you say things that are so close to self-awareness, I have trouble fathoming how stupid you are."

"Wow, fuck you?" You stand up, temples throbbing with the beginning of a stress headache. "Shit, ow. My head hurts, I'm going to lay down. Do you want me to tell her you're staying, or will you?"

"I don't need you to fight my battles for me."

"Not everything is a battle. For fuck's sake."

"That's what you said last time. Look how that turned out."

Yeah, him mixing you up with your ancestor is your cue to go. You rub your eyes and start off, then pause and turn back. He hasn't moved an inch.

"Hey," you say. "This place - do you think I could find information about recent conscriptions here?"

"You could look. But it's a research and preservation colony, not a census database. You'd be better off looking for the information in the actual census database. Which is a resource that exists, in case you'd forgotten."

"Okay, but if it's not in the official census database?"

"Then the conscripted party is dead."

Your bloodpusher sinks into your stomach. You assumed as much, but still - "There's nothing saying he's deceased, though. Nothing even saying he was conscripted. It's like he... he existed, and then he suddenly didn't. No updates, just an open file."

"Perhaps he ran, then. Stowed away on a ship and the Empire didn't care enough to hunt down one rogue wiggler. Assuming he is a wiggler, of course. Or your age. I know you're an adult, but you're all wigglers to me."

"His hivestem was razed to rubble."

"Then he's dead." The Helmsman releases his grip on the bench and floats a few inches in the air, turning toward you with one eyebrow arched, difficult to make out against the luminescence of his eyes. "An unclosed case isn't a sign of life. It's a sign of an Empire that doesn't give a fuck."

"He's your descendant," you say before you can stop yourself.

The gentle sway of his body freezes, and he hisses as he drops back to the bench like a stone. "Ow. Fuck."

It's your turn to raise an eyebrow. Lo and behold, the Helmsman may be capable of something other than cynicism. Who knew? "Does him being your descendant change anything?"

A derisive snort. "You seem to think I have an obligation to give a fuck about every poor bastard with my geneslime in their veins." He stands and stretches, his joints cracking around his ports, but the facade of calm is ruined by the way he turns his back to you and walks away. He never turns his back to anyone unless he needs to hide his face.

"We didn't find his body in the rubble," you say.

He keeps walking. "Not my fucking problem. If he's not in the systems then he's dead. Don't go probing places there's nothing to find. Waste of fucking brainpower. Get your priorities straight and maybe start focusing on the living."

You note the tension, the rage, the clipped sentences. Vulnerability. He's easier to read than he thinks.

"Do you know something?" you ask, but he doesn't respond, just elegantly flips you the bird before disappearing into a copse of trees.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> karkat could teach college level courses in "how to fuck up"

"So," you say, sitting down across from Feferi, "the Helmsman is fine. Also, he wants to stay on the colony after we go. He'll ask you himself later but he'll try to goad you into being a chutefisting asshat about it, because he's a gigantic goddamn tool. Just say he can."

The block reserved for the Empress here is a literal city block rather than one room, but Feferi's belongings take up barely any of the space. Besides relaxing in the underground pool and indulging in expensive bubble bath, she hasn't turned the place into the lap of luxury. She reasons that most of the time she spends here is spent sleeping or preparing to sleep, so there's no reason to. Right now, in the brief lull between meetings and crises, she doesn't have to be the Empress. You two can sit comfortably at the small dinner table and she can just be your friend.

Feferi's fins flutter. She props her chin up in her hands and lets out a quiet breath. "Why here?"

"What?"

"Why does he want to stay here?"

"Uh." You haven't pondered the question as deeply as you should. "Because it's pretty and peaceful? Fuck, if I wasn't busy with trying to make the galaxy suck less then I'd want to stay here too. He says he can do research and correspond with you from here if you need him. Did you really think he'd want to stay on the ship forever?"

"No. Of course not. But I'd hoped..." She folds her hands in her lap. "What do you think he'd do if I told him no?"

You draw in a sharp breath. "Yell at you for refusing what should be the simplest request of all time? Scratch that, I'd do the yelling. I'm halfway to yelling at you right now for having the audacity to even suggest that, actually, so" -

"I'm not going to tell him no. I just wanted to sea what you thought." Feferi rests her arms on the table between you, her shoulders slumping. She has to play energized and optimistic Empress everywhere except behind closed doors. With her makeup off, she looks sweeps older than she actually is. Exhausted.

"Okay. Well, good."

"Just make shore he doesn't have any maliseaous intent, okay?"

"I really don't think he does." You run a hand through your hair, shrugging. "Honestly I think he's just afraid of you and wants to get out of the political nightmare. Can't blame him. Politics are the fucking worst."

"Afraid of me. Still?"

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure you can't make that go away by being nice."

"He alwaves seams too angry to be afraid."

"Yeah, well. You'd be surprised how much fear anger can cover up."

She blinks and then lays her head on her arms with a quiet sigh. "I'm sorry, Karkat."

"It's okay." You pause. "Hey, have you ever told him about Sollux?"

She raises her head, narrowing her eyes. "What aboat him?"

"That he's missing? That he exists in the first place? Or... anything else?"

"For some reefson it seamed like a bad idea to mention his missing descendant is my matesprit. And planning to become my ship. Just a hunch."

You nod. She's tired enough. You'll tell her about the rest of the conversation later. "Get some rest. You're cranky when you haven't slept enough."

"You're cranky all the time." Feferi smiles.

"That's part of my charm," you say, and leave her be.

\---

Why does he want to stay here?

You doubt there's a deep ulterior motive. He went from being jacked into the most advanced network in the Fleet to being a partially pan-damaged troll. This place is the least stressful one you've come across, even though you know most of the research projects are a little more sinister. Gardens and books and no reason to fight - why wouldn't he want to retire here? All the knowledge in the Empire at his fingertips, no ship keeping him trapped and no Empress to terrify him.

Still, Feferi did ask you to check. You feel like the worst kind of lowlife as you pull up his tracker data to see what buildings he's frequented most often. There's one where he's been spending several hours a night, and it's out of the way from the city block you've been staying on. The navigational database says it contains restricted data and won't explain more than that.

You want to get a nap, but the stress headache is only going to get worse if you don't follow up. The Helmsman has returned to his block, so you're not worried about running into him as you take the shuttle to the building. It's just as beautiful and carefully crafted as the rest of the structures around it, nothing to set it apart besides the iris scanner beside the door.

The door buzzes you in without issue, even though letting Empire technology see your eyes still makes your bloodpusher stutter. There's one bookkeeper sitting behind a desk, a tealblood woman with braided hair. She looks up as you approach, the initial flicker of surprise smoothing into professionalism and a quick salute.

"How can I help you?" she asks.

"What's stored in here?"

"You don't know? Then what are you..." She frowns. "History and analysis of Empire uprisings and potential uprisings, spanning the past ten thousand sweeps."

Ice slides into your gut. Your first, irrational thought - _Why would he want to look into uprisings if he was trying to help us make things better? There's no fucking reason for any riots._ And then you realize.

"Is there information on the Sufferer here?" you ask.

She nods, as if surprised it's taken you so long to catch up. "All the information the Empire has."

"I want to look at it."

"It's all in the archives, I can show you to them. One book was checked out, but I believe we have another copy if you want to see it."

"Which book?"

"'An Unedited Collection of the Writings and Paintings of the Disciple,'" she says, and the readiness with which she has the title makes you think it wasn't checked out long ago. "Though the annotated versions of her writings have better context and analysis, and a translated version would be best if you don't speak Old Alternian. There are some works that are more... neutral on the subject of the revolution, than might be expected in any other place."

"Makes sense that they're restricted, then," you say. "I want to see the section."

The room you're led to is so packed with shelves that it's hard to navigate between them, and each shelf is stuffed with books. You know there's an organizational system here, but the sheer amount of information is overwhelming. A thousand times more information than you've been given on your ancestor, and you've pored over everything readily available to the public and then some.

"This shelf is primary sources and translations," she says, gesturing to one near the wall. "There's a translation of the Disciple's writings, if you'd like to see it. Then the contextual discussion, information about the history of the cult, notable members, lawful implications... This material is just that which directly corresponds to the Sufferer and related war and cult. Information about the Summoner's rebellion and any smaller scale rebellions influenced by the Sufferer is stored elsewhere. Is there something specific you're looking for?"

You only came here to make sure the Helmsman wasn't plotting murder, but you're a little dizzy and you might want to spend the next sweep reading through each shelf alphabetically. "Can I see the translation of the writings?"

She fishes the thick tome from the bottom shelf and hands it to you. "Anything else?"

"The one that was checked out - is it literally her writings? Like, eight thousand sweep old paper that she touched?"

"No, it's a copy, though the scans of the pages are all in her original handwriting. The photographs of the art are the same. It's not a transcription."

"And the person who checked it out? Was it the First Imperial Helmsman? Captor? Yellowblood, red and blue eyes?"

"Yes." She frowns deeper. "That was acceptable, correct? We don't allow more than one book to leave this building with any one person, and double check the clearance levels, so..."

"Yeah, don't worry." You hold the book against your chest. "I think this will keep me busy for a while. I'll let you know if I need anything else. Thanks for the help."

You tuck yourself into a chair in the back corner of the room, balancing the book on your lap. You quickly discover that the length is because her original handwriting has been preserved with the translations beside it. And it's not just transcriptions of the sermons and visions either. It's her journal, an entry for nearly every night spanning sweeps, some shorter than others, most chronicling mundane life experiences and funny antics.

"i have trouble conceptualizing that most people don't live like this. isn't this how we're meant to live? i felt empty living in fear in the woods, but i feel emptier in the cities. there's so much hate and violence and tension among the people. sign wants to smooth it all out but sometimes i just want to run away. sometimes i just want to sail out into the middle of the ocean or tuck myself into the desert and never have to face any of the pain again. it's so much better, just the four of us. it's so easy. and we get tired and hungry and irritable, it's part of being poor, but we're so safe and secure in each other, i don't understand how trolls can hate and be so afraid of each other - dammit. psii just told me to stop brooding and come chase psionic butterflies because he's bored. the true meowbeast in me can't pass up a chance to chase butterflies, even sparky fake ones! write later."

Your stomach hurts.

"a certaIIn 2omeone who will not be named forgot to eat for three nights, so sign's been lecturing him for... the better part of an hour. i'd write out the whole lecture in all its sordid detail, since i'm sure plenty of trolls could benefit from learning why food is awesome, but it's grossly pale. not so much lecturing as exasperated ranting interspersed with shooshpaps and horn rubs. the certain someone doesn't seem to mind much though. whoops, he just said he's going to forget to eat so he can get pale laid more often aaand there goes sign again. does he have an off switch? the crowd waits with bated breath. if he does, his beloved sure hasn't found it yet!"

"important update on hair brushing: rosa finished and then spent about fifteen minutes pursing her lips and trying to figure out what to do since my brushed hair defies gravity. i told her it's better to leave it be! but then she braided the Floofy Mane of Death and it actually feels nice. we're going to the city market to restock supplies, in honor of me actually bathing, since according to SOME PEOPLE that's a rare enough occasion to warrant celebration. i'm leaving the book behind. if psii snoops i'm going to kick his ass. no black intentions xoxo.

fIIght me dII meet me IIn the thre2hIIe pIIt II'm ready"

Your stomach hurts so bad.

You've gotten used to thinking of them as legendary figures. The Signless, the Sufferer, your ancestor. Heretic, visionary, cult leader, pacifist. The Disciple, his love, his trusted follower, writer, artist. The two of them together, the face of the movement and unity. The Dolorosa, mother, guardian, protector, warrior. The Psiioniic...

But this isn't a dramatic tale of legendary figures. The visions are there, yes, along with the sermons and teachings and values. The talks of the sermons and the people, salvation and idealism and hope, that's all here. But the snippets of night-to-night life interspersed, the idle comfort and interactions - it's the chronicles of a woman who felt just as much joy and pain and passion as any troll. You always knew they were real people, but this just makes it hurt. They've been dead for thousands of sweeps. You shouldn't be affected.

You flip through until you find the entries in the middle of the war, when they were losing and must have known. Most of these are shorter, the handwriting shakier.

"drones wiped out antha because we stayed there. population ten thousand. we're all fine. we left earlier this week. whole place is burning, most if not all are dead. rosa gave psii a sedative to make him stop screaming. sign started talking about turning himself in so i knocked him out to make sure he wouldn't sneak off. probably means a shouting match when he wakes up but i don't care. i don't know what to do."

"this isn't what we wanted"

"help"

"i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry"

You close the book. That's enough for one night.

It's nearly dawn, the sky lightening outside. This sun isn't quite as brutal as yours, but it is warm enough for daylight exposure to be unsafe. You set the book back on the shelf and thank the tealblood for her help - does she sleep here? - before taking the shuttle back.

You knock on the Helmsman's door. There's a shuffling from inside, and then he opens it a crack, blue eye peering out. "Yes?"

"You want to stay because everything left of your family is here. That's a good reason. You should tell Feferi that."

He shuts the door in your face.

You rap on it again, and again more insistently when he doesn't answer. "Dammit, I wasn't insulting you!"

The knob turns and the door opens wider this time, enough for you to see him fully. He's floating a few inches off the ground and glowering. "We're not talking about my family."

"Okay," you say. "What do you know about Sollux?"

"He's dead."

"Okay," you say again, "but I didn't actually say his name when I asked about your descendant, so you must know who he is even if you don't know what happened to him."

His lip curls. "Yes. I keep tabs on my descendants to see what ship they get assigned to. I don't make a point of caring about them and I certainly don't get attached. Sollux Captor, my descendant, promising psionic powers. Apparently missing. Close to you, but not my problem."

"If you know anything about what happened, why his hivestem was" -

"Nothing I know will help you or put your mind at ease, so step the fuck back." He's nearly snarling, sparks flickering between his horns, and the sudden hostility is startling enough that you do. "Are you finished with your interrogation? You're pissing me off."

"I just need to know what you know," you say as evenly as you can manage. "Even if he is dead. I need to know what happened. For closure."

"The Empire happened."

"That's impressively vague." You hold your hands out. "You'd do the same, wouldn't you? If it was you trying to find out what happened to your loved ones? You'd want all the information you can get."

His eyes widen. Then a slow grin creeps over his face, hollow and pained, like the corners of his mouth are being jerked upward by manic puppet strings. "Fuck you, you vile little shitstain," he says pleasantly, and slams the door in your face.

Well. He definitely knows something.

You put your hands on your hips and survey the door for a minute, debating the merits of knocking. He's crotchety and volatile, but you've discovered that his anger is never without reason, even if the reason isn't readily apparent. If Sollux was dead, he'd... tell you whatever it is that he isn't telling you, right?

Hmm. If he somehow found out that Sollux was going to helm...

You tap your knuckles sharply against the doorframe. "Hey. Feferi isn't going to hurt him. Do you know where he is? You don't have to protect him."

No response.

"Psii," you call, in the hopes that using his old name will piss him off enough to confront you.

Still no response. 

"I'm sorry," you try. "Fuck, I'm sorry, that was a shitty thing to say."

Nothing.

You pinch the bridge of your nose and return to your room, shooting Feferi a quick message.

CG: IN OTHER NEWS, I'M PRETTY SURE THE HELMSMAN HATES ME.  
CG: APPARENTLY INVOKING DEAD FAMILY MEMBERS TO GET WHAT YOU WANT IS A BAD IDEA  
CG: WHO KNEW?  
CG: FUCK, I'M A JACKASS.  
CG: MORE ON THIS "KARKAT IS AN INSUFFERABLE JACKASS AND HAS LIKE TEN THOUSAND APOLOGIES TO MAKE" FRONT LATER.  
CG: GET SOME REST.

It's time to go the fuck to sleep.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sucks to be sollux tbh

The next evening you start your night the way you always do - sending scathing half-awake replies to the stupid emails in your inbox, then flagging the ones that require actual conscious thought to examine later. With Feferi tied up in meetings with the preservationists all night, your schedule is free, so you return to the library and dig deeper into the Disciple's journals.

You're halfway through her careful transcription of the Dolorosa's remedy for seasickness when you hear a sharp gasp. Looking up, you discover the Helmsman watching you, his arms balancing a stack of books tall enough that you're sure he's holding it up with psionics.

"Hi," you say, closing the book and standing up. "I was just reading. You want to sit down? They should really put more chairs in here but I guess there's not a lot of traffic. Still, I'm going to write a strongly worded letter to whoever's in charge of interior decorating."

"What are you doing here."

"Reading?" You hold up the book so he can see. "Really, reading. I'm not lying in wait or some shit. If I was going to lie in wait I'd just fall asleep outside your block and wait for you to trip on me."

"Why."

"Am I not allowed to be curious about my ancestor?"

He's watching you with the kind of narrowed gaze that makes you feel like you're being dissected, so you add, "Look. I'm trying to get this fucking world right, okay? And I'm not sure I can find the words or the longwinded essays to explain how much I have no fucking idea what I'm doing. You're a huge fan of pointing out my inexperience and general stupidity, so I hope it's not goddamn shocking that I'd want his teachings as a starting point. His ideas are all good and he's right about pretty much everything. His only problem was that he was preaching in a world that wasn't ready for the truth, but this one is. I want to get it right."

The Helmsman steps forward and sets his books down on the table beside the chair, laying his palms flat against the wood. He won't look at you. "I wish," he starts, and breaks off with a shuddering breath.

You frown. "You wish what?" That he'd done something different? That the Signless had succeeded? That you were someone different? That the Empire didn't exist?

"I wish I'd killed him the second I found out he was an abomination."

That was not what you were expecting. You chew on your lip. You can't yell at him, and you don't want to walk away. Not if you can get him to tell you what he's hiding. Not taking into account that you don't think he considers the Signless an abomination in the slightest, and he just wants to get on your bad side over the freak swill in your veins.

"You loved him," you say.

"Love wasn't worth it."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because every time I speak to you I feel sicker inside," he says, "and I wish you would leave me alone, because I hate you like I hated _her_ and I love you the same way I loved her and I thought at least a new Empress would free me from this day terror."

"Uh." You may consider yourself an expert on psychology and quadrant vacillation and blurring, but this is one leap you can't quite understand. Pale you know about, when he gets confused and thinks you're the Signless come back from the dead for him. The rest... "How am I - how am I like the Condesce?"

"You know I don't have a choice about loving you and you use it to make me do whatever you want," he says, "and then you turn around and call me manipulative. Fuck you. I'm not crazy. You show up and talk like him and touch me like him when you want something and then you disappear because I don't fucking matter unless you're getting something from me."

You swallow. "I'm. I'm sorry."

He sinks into the chair.

"I'm sorry I invoked your family yesterday, when I asked you about Sollux. I'm sorry. I knew as soon as I said it that it was a shitty thing to do." You hug the book to your chest, trying to keep your shoulders straight rather than hunching them defensively. "And I know it's not the first time I've done that, and I'm sorry. I just get frustrated, I - I want you to remember the things you used to care about. But I think I've been really fucking unfair to you. I'm sorry."

He pulls a book from the middle of his stack at random and flips to the middle. "Yes, well. I could do without the constant reminder of how vile they'd find me should they see me now. Or the constant reminder that I'm worth nothing to you unless I'm pleasing you and the Empress. When the ship leaves, I never want you to contact me again. I never want to have to look at you again. You're fucking killing me."

You nod. "Okay," you say, taking a deep breath. That's fair. You suspect that in the time you've known him, you haven't done anything except damage him worse. Sometimes it's best to take a step back from people you've hurt rather than seek their forgiveness. That's not something you needed to learn from your ancestor. Life experience has taught you at least a few things.

"I'll leave you be, okay? I won't ever talk to you again unless you approach me first. But before I do I need one last thing. I swear, just this. I really do need to know what you know about Sollux."

"Fuck you."

"He's one of my best friends."

"Has the Empress asked you to interrogate me like this?" he asks. "I won't be surprised. Pan damaged doesn't mean stupid. I know they were fucking."

On second thought, this might not be a conversation you want to have with a pyrokinetic psion in a library surrounded by irreplaceable tomes of knowledge.

"They were matesprits," you say carefully. "Are matesprits."

He snorts. "Peixes and Captors. It's a sickness."

"She didn't ask me to ask you about it, though. She doesn't even know you know Sollux exists. I'm asking for my own sake."

He slumps down in the chair, closing the book and raking a hand through his hair. "If I tell you what I know," he says, "you'll wish you hadn't asked. For all intents and purposes, he's dead. It would be best to leave it at that."

You feel nauseous. You walk away from him and return the book to its shelf, then steel yourself and curl your hands into fists.

"I need to know," you say as you return.

He's drawn his knees to his chest and propped his book up on them. "I knew it was too much to hope that you'd left for real."

"I need to know."

"Starships aren't the only things that run on psionic power. Where do you think your city power comes from? Any of the power that runs these colonies, or the communication networks between them?"

You nod. You have a pretty good idea where this is going, and it's - not good, but you still have a chance. "So Sollux was jacked into a power plant instead of a starship?"

"As far as I know."

"Do you know which one? We've been looking in the wrong place, then - we just need to figure out where to search and we can..."

"It's a little more complicated than that," he interrupts, closing his book and meeting your gaze, the eye contact an unspoken challenge. "Starship helmsrigs aren't universal. The bioware is configured the way it is because it allows for easy access to the helmsman for maintenance, while the neural interfaces allow the helmsman to communicate with the crew. That setup is important when your helmsman has more responsibility than just a living battery. Power plant psions aren't needed for anything other than their psionics. No one cares about them because they aren't trolls anymore. Living fuel cells, to be drained and replaced as needed. They don't need to communicate and they don't need maintenance - they're all the ones who weren't smart enough or powerful enough to make helmsmen. They're not given proper titles or identities after conscription. They're stolen away and stripped of their signs and names and no one ever hears about them again. Then when they burn out, they're replaced and the body is incinerated. It's efficient."

"But that - you - what the fuck are you saying? What happens to them?"

"Like I said. It's complicated." He finally breaks eye contact with you, glancing down at his hands where they're wrapped around the book, breathing out quietly through his nose. "Bioware is made of a combination of organic and synthetic material, twisted together in the most fucked up possible way by Imperial scienterrorists. You know that, right?"

You nod.

"Power plant bioware is mostly self-sufficient, and also mostly organic material. Think of it as... a prison in and of itself, made of a series of sealed-off cells. Said cells can hold one psion and provide enough nutrition and hydration to keep them alive. In turn, the bioware feeds and strengthens itself on the power the psion gives off, and funnels the excess to the core of the plant, where it can then be distributed to the masses. Sollux will be in one of those. From the inside it's essentially a sensory deprivation chamber."

His gaze stays firmly on his hands and the book, unfocused, clearly not reading any of the words on the page. When he continues, his voice is as detached as though he's still hooked into his systems, reading from a conscription manual.

"The most unfortunate part of the setup is that the psion is fully conscious the whole time, aware they're trapped, but unable to escape or communicate. With how long ago Sollux was taken, I doubt there's anything left of his mind, so don't go looking for him."

"Please tell me you're fucking with me."

"I don't have enough imagination to fuck with you like this."

"I'm." You sink down against the shelf and press your forehead to your knees. There's not enough air in the space around you. "I'm. I'm. Where is he, which plant, I have to..."

"Were you not listening? I don't know. It's not information you can find. No one knows because no one cares. He's an interchangeable fuel cell. So are the rest of the millions of sign-stripped psions." He pauses, but you can't tell if he's looking at you, distracted as you are by trying to breathe. "The Empire has no mercy for traitors. I suspect someone found out he was allied with the Heiress."

"I'm gonna. I'm gonna throw up."

"Fuck. Don't throw up on the books."

You need to get out of the library, drag yourself into the street and gulp fresh air and puke up everything in your system. You need to make your legs work. Fuck that, you need to make your lungs work, because you're hyperventilating and the edges of your vision are darkening and you can't, you can't, you can't

you can't get up, your limbs are jelly. You lean forward and vomit all over the floor.

"Shit." The Helmsman stands up.

"All those people, oh god, oh god, how many, and he's, oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, I didn't know, I didn't KNOW..."

"Okay. Okay, listen. Fuck, I don't remember how to - one moment." He kneels beside you, avoiding the puddle of vomit, reaching out to touch your cheek.

The panic claws your chest to ribbons. "I didn't know, I didn't know, I didn't know, oh my god, oh my god, I can't breathe" -

His fingers hook under your chin and turn your face toward his, his skin just cool enough to offset the sudden burning behind your eyes. "Shh," he says. "I could probably have been more sensitive about how to tell you that. Shh. Shh, it's okay, breathe."

"All those people, I can't, I can't" -

"We're going outside." The Helmsman hooks his arms under your back and legs, hoisting you into the air like you weigh nothing. If you were in any fit state of mind, you'd gripe about him cheating with psionics, but as it is you just press your face into his shoulder and continue gasping.

You don't register that you're moving until you hear the alarmed voice of the tealblood. "Sir? Do you need a medic?"

The Helmsman says something to her in Old Alternian, but she asks again: "Do you need a medic?"

"I'm fine," you wheeze.

Later you'll have to deal with the humiliation of being carried outside by a skin-and-bones psion because you were having a panic attack too intense to move, but for now you wrap your arms around him and claw at his back.

"Easy, little one," he says, remarkably calm. "You're fine."

The night air hits you as the Helmsman exits the library and starts down the steps. You gulp, filling your lungs as fast as possible, desperately trying to fight the dizziness enough to avoid throwing up again.

He sets you down on the bottom step. "You're fine."

You cover your mouth to keep from dry heaving, squeezing your eyes shut.

"Shh," he says again. "I'm sorry. I forgot how much it would matter to you."

"'Snot your fault." You raise your head and watch the street, waiting for your pulse to stop racing. "I have to - have to tell Feferi. There's no way she knows. I mean she might know a little bit but there's no way she _knows._ "

"Shh." The Helmsman settles down beside you. "There's nothing you can do about it. What are you planning to use for power instead? How are you going to rehabilitate the psions who can be rehabilitated? Where will you get the resources in the first place? How will you match up their identities? Do you mercy cull the ones who are too far gone to heal?"

"Oh my god. Oh my god. Stop. Stop. Stop. You're not helping the panic attack."

"Sorry."

You hug your knees to your chest, past caring about looking like a wiggler. "I don't fucking understand how - how this could even happen, how anyone could ever think this is acceptable, I knew the Condesce was twisted but I didn't think even she..."

"We fucked up our planet beyond all reason. Our species, I mean."

You shoot him a sharp glance. "How is that relevant?"

"We mined all our fossil fuels, weathered away the ozone layer, drastically changed the environment, pushed multiple important species to extinction. There was the daywalker epidemic, the mass cullings and fighting in the streets for scant resources, overpopulation - about seventy apocalypse factors at once. Psionic power was more efficient than nuclear power and could take us into the stars. Save us. When it comes down to you and your neighbor both dying, or you surviving at the cost of your neighbor's life, the choice is obvious to most people."

"So what? You're saying conscripting psions like this was a good decision?"

"I'm saying the idea came in a time turbulent enough for it to pass. And that the last Empress saved us from dying out. Do I think that was a good decision? No. It would have been better if our race had gone extinct millenniums ago."

"Were you alive for those? The first conscriptions?"

"Hah, no. The limebloods weren't even extinct yet. I may be old, little one, but I'm not that old. I just had a lot of time to listen to her stories."

"She was probably full of shit."

"She made sense. It doesn't matter now, anyway. Things are the way they are."

"You have the fucking shittiest worldview. 'Oh, changing it would be hard and might not work, so why fucking bother?' Spare me. You may think you're wise for being a cynical bastard about everything, but you're not. You're just complacent."

He shrugs. "I'm content with my complacence."

"Are you really? Because you were just telling me how..."

You bite your tongue, and he arches an eyebrow. "I was just telling you how what?"

"I said I wasn't going to bring your family up anymore. The least I can do is stick to that."

"Ah. How vile they find me. The thing about me, little one, is that I like to ruminate on how terrible I am while doing nothing about it. Keeps me young and lazy."

"Right. Great. Glad we had this discussion." You pull yourself to your feet, your breathing finally close to normal, the world steadying around you. "I need to talk to Feferi. I won't involve you if you don't want me to. Is there information here on the different kinds of bioware?"

"I'm sure there is. Look it up in the index."

"Okay. Are you coming?"

"Not a chance. I'm going to go clean up your vomit so Deidre doesn't have to, and then read. Like I was planning to. Before you accosted me."

"Her name's Deidre?"

"You really should introduce yourself to the people working for you. It's only polite."

You flip him the bird and leave to get a shuttle.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a revelation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you haven't cried over the song various storms and saints yet then you really should

You fully intend to put together a research paper and practical plan before you talk to Feferi, possibly pulling a few all-dayers and keeping a trash pail near you for the multiple times you heave, but Aradia Megido interrupts you.

"Guess who?" she says as soon as you step into your block.

You very nearly eviscerate her. "What the fuck!"

"I pinged you on your comm to say that I needed to talk to you." She's not perturbed in the slightest by the sickle in your hand, unsheathed so fast you barely remember the motion. Her hair is pulled back in a ponytail, a few strands curling around her face, and her grin reflects the dim light of your coonside lamp.

Right. That was one of the several dozen emails. "I didn't realize it had somehow become so urgent you needed to break into my block."

"It's not. But you'll only be here for so long, and I want to run the idea by you before you leave."

"So you broke into my block for no reason."

"Where is your sense of adventure?"

"I literally could have killed you. Like I am literally standing here holding a weapon right now."

"Oh please, Karkat." She snorts with laughter, closing your door and turning your lights up higher. Rest in pieces, any chances of laying down and sleeping properly.

"I could have! I am much better at combat than when you saw me last."

"I'm sure you are. So anyway, some of the species here have been cultivated to a point where they may be safe to reintroduce to Alternia. I think it would be an important project for Fef's rule, to show that she's committed to stabilizing the planet."

"That was what you needed to break into my block to tell me."

"You're easier to get a hold of these nights than she is. And we have more history than I have with any of her other go-to advisers. And you're my friend and I missed you."

"And I'm exhausted and need sleep, so if you'd like to drag your horns out of your ass long enough to realize that not every single person is as delighted by everything as you, that would be fantastic."

Her eyes narrow. She zeroes in on your distress like a shark pinpointing a drop of blood in gallons upon gallons of water, because she is the absolute worst. "What's wrong?"

"What, aside from the fact that my block apparently has zero security to keep out actual assassins, several of whom are likely targeting me if the death threats I receive nightly are any indication?"

"Yes, aside from that." She hops onto your reclining platform and tucks her legs under her body. "I don't have to be pale for someone to tell when they're upset."

"And I don't have to be pale for someone to be offput by their manic cheer, especially when their actual moirail is missing."

"Wow!" she says, with the same level of brightness. "Here's the thing, though! Some people don't like to spend every waking second wallowing in the pits of misery. Been there, done that! Not doing it again! Eat me!"

"Yeah. Okay, sorry. That was a fucked up thing to say. I've become the goddamn emperor of fucked up things to say lately. You'd think I could put my foot in my mouth less often, especially considering I'm not six sweeps old anymore, but alas. The foot, it's there. It crawls down my protein chute like a worm insistent on burrowing all the way through my digestive tract and into my bowels."

"Did you learn something? Is that what you're so upset about?"

"What? No."

"Tell me."

"What! No!"

"Karkat."

Let the record show that Aradia Megido can be very persuasive.

\---

Let the record also show that Aradia Megido is a terrifying force of nature when she wants to be, which means that after one sleepless day you're sitting down with her and Feferi and the other advisers, nursing an even worse headache. It doesn't take long to relay what the Helmsman told you about psionic power plants. You want to rest your head on the table and wait for all of this to be over, but Feferi pushes her chair back and stands up shaking with rage, and hmm. Maybe you can stay awake a little longer.

"How many of you knew about this," she says, curling her fingers around the edge of the table.

"None of us could have known the state of your matesprit" -

"How many of you," she repeats, deathly calm, "knew about this, and knew that I did not know, and did not see fit to tell me."

Silence.

"Don't everyone speak up at once," she says.

Further silence. She's dropped the fish puns. Hoo boy, you never want to be on Fef's bad side.

"A lesser Empress might have the lot of you tossed into space for this. In a certain light withholding such important information might look like treason."

"Your reign is still young. There were a thousand more pressing matters to look into first, surely this information would have come to light when the time was right..."

She holds up a hand, and the seadweller at the opposite side of the table falls silent, a purple flush creeping up his neck. "If I want to foster a culture of nonviolence then I too need to partake in nonviolence. Regardless of how much my instincts may be begging me to _tear all of your throats out with my teeth_. Now. If you're finished babbling and falling over yourselves to ensure your own safety, help me draft a plan to rescue the psions."

"Impossible," says the seadweller.

"Ah." Fef's smile is terrifying, all Condesce, and you hate yourself for thinking that, and you hate yourself for being so damn entertained. She's a thousand times more intimidating than you could ever hope to be. "You may have noticed that I'm furious. Do not tell me what is and isn't possible."

Aradia, seated on your right, nudges you with her elbow. "Are all these meetings so hilarious?"

"You are witnessing something beautiful," you mumble back.

She clears her throat, speaking up. "As a historian and a psionic, may I make a suggestion?"

"Go ahead."

"It would make sense to research the power methods we used before the psionic draft, as well as the power methods conquered species used. Then you can plan how to switch the power over. You might also want to research less vile rigging while the transition is being prepared. And cancel any and all nonconsensual military drafts in the meantime, particularly of psionics."

"Thank you." Feferi sinks back into her chair. "See, someone my age has sense. Stop thinking it's impossible. Get over yourselves and help me. I swear I will keep you at this table for a perigree if I have to."

Aradia half-raises a hand. "If I may say something else?"

"Of course."

"Sollux was obsessive about making sure his security was strong. Unless he made some kind of stupid mistake, a routine bot wouldn't have picked up the communications he was sending. If whoever's responsible for his arrest would like to speak up, feel free. I am not nearly as committed to nonviolence as our illustrious Empress, but I might decide not to murder you in your 'coon. I am a pretty friendly person!"

Something clicks forcefully in your mind, less a lightbulb flickering on and more a battering ram of knowledge hitting you hard in the chest. You place a hand over your bloodpusher to be sure you haven't actually broken any ribs, losing the ability to breathe.

_You seem to think I have an obligation to give a fuck about every poor bastard with my geneslime in their veins._

Oh fuck. Oh god, you've had it backwards all this time.

_I keep tabs on my descendants to see what ship they get assigned to._

"I'll be right back," you say.

"Karkat." Feferi reaches for your hand as your chair scrapes back, and you are not practiced enough in diplomacy to hide the frantic agitation in the movement. A skilled mediator would gracefully excuse themselves and go sort shit out with cold logic, but unfortunately you've never been able to untangle emotion and reason and once again you feel like you're going to be sick.

It must show on your face, this panic-edged need for escape, and you're trying to remember everything you know about calmness and failing. All you know is that you need to get out of the room right now, and after a few endless seconds of locked eyes, Feferi releases your hand.

"What's going on?" she asks.

"I'll tell you when I know," you say. "You all keep talking, make plans, catch me up when I get back, I'll be right - right back, I swear."

To your immense and unending credit, you make it all the way to the door no faster than a brisk walk. It's not until the heavy iron closes behind you that you break into a sprint, head pounding, lungs searing, fists clenched so tightly your claws threaten to break skin. The shuttle to the library won't move fast enough so you pace in the enclosed car like that'll speed it up, raking your hands through your hair over and over and over, clumps coming out between your fingers.

_Promise never to trust me._

Oh god you're so stupid stupid STUPID you put his tics and self loathing down to Captor neuroses because you assumed it was in the genes, because Sollux would never, because the Helmsman was your ancestor's moirail once upon a time and you know he's fucked up but he's fucked up under order of the last Empress and he had to know that wasn't his fault but oh, God, there are reasons he won't let anyone call him Psii.

You find him leaning over the information desk with his hands tracing shapes in the air, Deidre sitting across from him, and the scene is at such direct odds with your mood that you have trouble processing it for a second. The world isn't ending for literally everyone else?

But no, of course it isn't. He's actually smiling, chattering to her so fast in Old Alternian that it's impossible to pick up any of the language, completely separate from any side to him you've ever seen. Your pan briefly shorts out as you register that this is the closest you've seen to the Psii in the journals, that he's still in there somewhere, and -

Deidre notices you first and stands. The Helmsman looks over his shoulder, his hands dropping and his voice dying off as he takes in your expression.

"I need to talk to you," you say.

"What happened?"

"I need to talk to you," you repeat, and hate the way the edge in your voice borders panic more than firmness. "Alone."

His ears flatten. "I'll be right back," he tells the tealblood. His shoulders are straight and stiff as he pushes past you to get outside, standing on the steps of the building.

"Well?" he says.

"Somewhere less public than this."

"Oh. Alone alone. Is someone hurt?"

You shake your head once and start down the steps.

"There'd better be a really good fucking reason why you need me," he snaps.

You turn, curl your lips back, and you know you're posturing yourself like you're ready to kill him and you know you need to keep your emotions in check until you have all the facts and you know you're not being fully rational and you don't care, you don't care, you are irrational and you don't care.

"It was you," you say. "You turned Sollux in."

You wait for him to deny it. You wait for him to call you crazy, or panrotted, or to get angry, or to laugh at you for being a moron. You are desperate for his denial, for him to tell you that you're working yourself into a frenzy over nothing and you are wrong and you're horrible for thinking he'd be capable of that but it's you who's horrible, it's you, it's you.

He doesn't move. The agitation on his face melts away, and he surveys you like a court member debating the merits of eating a groveling rustblood for lunch.

"Ah," he says finally.

"'Ah,'" you repeat. "That's all you have to say. That's all you fucking have to say."

"I'm not sure what else you expect me to say."

That's enough to hit a breaking point, a wire of rage in your chest stretched taut and then snapped, and any semblance of control you're hanging onto dissolves. You're not quite conscious of the movement, dizzy with fury and halfway outside your body, but you lower your head and charge forward and your horns meet him squarely in the middle of the chest. The impact would be enough to gore him if they were sharper, but as it is they just shove him onto the steps, the breath knocked out of his lungs.

"Where is he, where is he, you maggot-ridden rotten putrid lying sack of SHIT!" You're screaming, clawing for his face, frenzied. "TELL ME WHERE HE IS OR I SWEAR TO GOD I'M GOING TO REACH ALL THE WAY DOWN YOUR SQUAWK BLISTER AND REARRANGE YOUR INTERNAL ORGANS AND THEN RIP OUT YOUR VOCAL CORDS ON THE WAY UP, I SWEAR TO GOD I'M GOING TO FEEL YOU DIE UNDER MY HANDS, YOU SACK OF FESTERING GARBAGE" -

Psionics anchor around your chest and pull you back, not unlike a pair of arms wrapping around you to hold you down. You kick at the empty air, screaming more with indignation now than anything, and you may as well be six sweeps old again and ready to fight anyone who so much as looked at you wrong, you're ready to kill -

\- "LET ME GO, LET ME GO, I'M GOING TO RIP YOU TO FUCKING PIECES, I'M GOING TO RIP YOU TO FUCKING PIECES AND FEED THEM TO THE BARKBEASTS AND THEN I'M GOING TO TAKE A DUMP IN YOUR SHAT-OUT BODY PARTS, TELL ME WHERE HE IS, TELL ME WHERE HE IS, TELL ME WHAT YOU DID WITH HIM YOU EVIL FUCKING _TRAITOR_ " -

"Enough," the Helmsman says quietly. 

He sits up with a small wince. You clawed his cheek - he brings a hand up to touch the wound, his fingers coming away sticky with gold. And his back must have hit the edge of the steps hard. You're too angry to feel anything but vindictive satisfaction.

"I don't know where he is," he says.

"Bullshit!" you yell. "Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit, you turned him in, you found out what he was doing and you turned him in, tell me where the fuck he is, tell me where you PUT HIM" -

"I had no say in where he was placed, little one. I don't know where he is. Do you truly think I wouldn't tell you if I knew where to find him?"

"Yes!" you shout, and he flinches. "You keep fucking lying through your teeth about what you know and getting any information out of you is like pulling claws and you hate me and you hate Feferi and you hate Sollux for being in a relationship with her and you hate this world and you don't have loyalty to anyone except the Condesce so yes, yes, yes, I think you'd sit on the information, I think you'd sit back and watch us all scrambling to find him and _laugh_ " -

The psionics holding you back dissolve. You trip as you stumble forward, pitching toward him, unbalanced by the sudden lack of pressure. He catches you around the waist and holds you tightly as you beat his shoulders with closed fists, tears running down your face.

\- "you have to tell me, you have to tell me where he is, you have to tell me," and he's rubbing your back, shushing you softly, and you are so angry and tired and hurt and you just want this to be over.

He keeps you held gently against him, even though he could snap your neck or turn you to ash in less than a second, and you realize he's making no move to fight back against you, and he could if he wanted to, he could.

You press your face into his chest and sob like a child.

Later it will matter that you did this on the steps of the building, in view of all the passing satellites and shuttles, in view of anyone inside who happened to look out a window, but you can't bring yourself to get up. You cry like a lost wiggler until you run out of energy, for Sollux and for every other psionic who's ever been conscripted and for Feferi and for yourself and for the state of this whole festering universe. When you stop heaving, you sit up and pull out your comm, discovering no less than fifteen messages from Feferi and Aradia and the other advisers wondering where the fuck you are.

You sniffle, wiping your eyes and nose. Oh god, your head hurts. "Everything is terrible."

The Helmsman sits up beside you, wrapping his arms around his knees, chin resting on top. The scratches on his cheek have long since ceased to bleed, scabbed over in dark yellow, but he moves like he hurts. You probably really did fuck up his back pushing him on the steps.

"Does the Empress know?" he asks.

"No one knows. I just figured it out."

"How?"

"Sollux was conscripted so violently. By drones who obviously came equipped to deal with a psionic troll. There were a lot of us involved in the network he set up. He was very careful with the security. The only reason he would have been caught was if someone was watching him specifically." You wipe your eyes again, let out a shuddering breath. "You keep tabs on your descendants."

"Everything I told you earlier was true. About the power plants, and the conscriptions. I don't know where they took him and I don't know how to find him. I would tell you if I did. I have no reason not to."

"No reason besides spite," you say. "And apparently spite is an excellent motivator."

"I don't know where he is."

"How could you? He's your fucking offspring."

"If I had my way, I wouldn't have offspring to begin with." He won't look at you. "I find it interesting that this is your breaking point. You know I've extinguished billions of lives and destroyed the majority of this galaxy, you know I loved the last Empress, but fuck forbid I do my duty by informing the proper authorities that an individual yellowblood was plotting acts of terrorism and treason. No, that is too much."

"The breaking point is that you _lied to me_ ," you spit. "Over and over again, you fucking lied to me, you lied to Feferi, you lied to all of us, so how the fuck am I supposed to trust anything you say? How the fuck am I supposed to trust that you don't know more than you're letting on? How am I supposed to trust that you aren't planning to hurt her, how am I supposed to trust that you're not still so panwashed by the Condesce that you'd want to see this world crumble out of sheer spite, how am I supposed to..."

"This is why it's smarter to cull loose ends than keep them around in the hopes that they'll be helpful," he says. "I did tell you not to trust me. I lied to you about Sollux. But I've never been anything but honest with you about what I am. It's not my fault you chose not to listen."

"Why lie about Sollux, then? If you're trying so hard to convince us that you're the pinnacle of evil and deserve a culling fork to the chest then why lie about that? That would have been the fastest way to make Feferi want you dead."

"I did not want you to know."

"Why."

"Maybe if you think very, very hard about the hysterical meltdown you just had, then you might pick up a few clues."

You grip your hair, yanking out a few more strands. "Why did you only turn him in? You could have followed his communication network to everyone else he was making plans with. Feferi was well protected in the ocean but me - you could have gotten me killed in an instant. Same with Aradia, Terezi, Equius, Eridan... we're all alive and well and Sollux isn't. Why only him?"

"The network itself was not a concern to me. A handful of wigglers playing at politics should not have been enough to threaten the full might of the Empire. But it was important that the Heiress not have access to that kind of psionic power. I needed to undercut her resources, like I undercut the resources of every Heiress before her. The trial was rigged. I have no idea how she won."

"So it. It wasn't about Sollux at all. Not really."

"It was about ensuring my Empress won the challenge."

"But. But if you had access to Sollux's network then you must have had access to Feferi's too. You must have known she was planning for hemoequality, that she wanted to make things better for lowbloods, that she wanted to change the cultural violence. You must have known that she wasn't going to be like the Condesce, you must have known she... you still sabotaged her?"

"It would have been better for the people if she'd lost," he says, still staring straight ahead, still refusing to so much as glance at you. "An Empress is an Empress. That amount of power comes with too many life-or-death decisions. You can't go a night without indirectly killing someone, no matter how peaceful you try to be. It twisted my Empress. It will twist Feferi. The initial intentions don't matter, little one. An Empress will always be an Empress and regime changes cause nothing but upheaval. Millions of people will die before things settle, and for fucking nothing. An Empress is an Empress."

Unbelievably, a twinge of pity curls through your chest. Now that the all-consuming fury and betrayal have both abated slightly, you're starting to better see how his mind works, and fuck.

"Oh my god," you say. "She fucked you up so bad."

"Signless would agree with me," he says with a stubbornness that borders on petulance. "A government run by one individual will never benefit the people at large."

"Well, this is what we have to work with right now. If we have to put up with a government run by one individual, then isn't it better to have an individual who cares about the people than one who doesn't?"

"An Empress is an Empress. End of story."

You're too tired to argue. "I need to tell Feferi and Aradia about why - about what happened to Sollux."

"Mmm. Feel free. If the Empress doesn't cull me, I'm sure the Megido will." He rubs his eyes. "I'm ready for that confrontation, at least."

"Do you really want to die so badly?"

He's silent for a few seconds. "My life can be divided into four eras," he says eventually. "The first, when I was initially enslaved and miserable. The second, when I was with my family and awake and free. The third, at the helm. The fourth, this ridiculous attempt at repairing me back into who I was in my second life. I am so tired of other people deciding what's best for me. I am so tired in general. If the Empress has her way then this life for me will be just as long as my previous one, and we all know it. If I was determined to be dead right now, I would be dead. All I want is a guarantee that someday this will be _over_."

You reach out to touch his shoulder, pleased when he doesn't shrink away. "I won't let her keep you alive forever."

He finally turns to face you, his eyes duller than they usually are, clouded with misery. "You're still pretending it will matter what you want," he says with a small smile. "I wish you the best of luck."

"Do you want to come with me? Have the opportunity to defend yourself?"

His ears flick downward. "No. I would like to go back inside and tell Deidre I'm likely to be arrested. She's my friend. She should know."

"Okay." You flex your fingers, standing up. "I'm, uh. I'm sorry. For attacking you."

"It's all right," he says. "It's been a long time since I got the living shit beat out of me. It was cathartic."

"Right. I can't actually tell if that was sarcastic or not, but. Okay. Right. I'm gonna. I'm gonna go."

"I do not envy you being the one to tell her any of this," he says with a new, jagged-edged smile. "I mean it. Good luck."

You flip him the bird.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> things go about as well as can be expected

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh boy

"So I guess it's up to you two, what you want to do," you say, looking back and forth between Feferi and Aradia's faces. "Given that you're his quadrantmates."

Feferi's skin is ashy pale while Aradia's cheeks are flushed. At the very least, neither of them look like they're going to run off on a murderous rampage. But they are tenser than usual, and Aradia's knuckles are white where her hands are clasped in her lap.

"So if he's to be believed," she says, "nothing would have come of him telling you. Or at least, that's what he thought. He thought Sollux was a lost cause and a confession would spark unnecessary conflict."

"Uh. Yeah."

"And he was doing his job. It's not his fault that the values of the Empire during his service were in direct contrast to the values of your Empire."

You pick at the edge of your sleeve. "Honestly, I wasn't expecting that rational a reaction from you. I mean considering you threatened murder earlier and all."

Aradia chews on the inside of her cheek. "Mmm. That was because I'd assumed a highblood had turned him in and reaped some kind of monetary reward or political promotion. A slave turning him in is a different beast entirely."

Feferi tilts her head. "You pity the Helmsman?"

Aradia's voice turns sharper, colder. "I'm not completely devoid of emotion, thanks. Don't you?"

"Of coarse I do," she says. "But I made the mistake of seaing him as nofin moar than a victim when I took him out of the heelmscolumn, and he still hates me for it."

"He didn't hate you for seeing him as a victim," you say. "He hated you for not respecting his autonomy."

"Because I didn't reelize he had autonomy to respect," she says. When you and Aradia both flinch, she adds, " _Which was a mistake_. And not one I want to make again. But I think I might have to."

"What are you talking about?"

She explains.

When she's done, you're having trouble categorizing every single reason this is a terrible idea, and you feel like there's a five paragraph rant you should launch into once it's properly formed, introduction and conclusions and annotations helpfully included for easier perusal. But Aradia beats you to it while you're still processing.

"Feferi," she says, much calmer and more level headed than you would be, "I know more about revenge than I hope you and Karkat ever do. Trust me on this. Even when you get the outcome you thought you wanted, the price always ends up steeper than you bargained for, and the victory not nearly as satisfying."

"This isn't aboat reefenge," Feferi says.

"Are you sure?" you ask.

She nods. "I thought aboat it alreedy. Trying to decide if this is logic oar anger. I don't want to be the Empress who acts out of anger, even aboat the little things. I don't want to be the Empress who acts out of selfishness oar greed oar a need for vengseance. But I do want to be the Empress who acts in the best interests of the people. And a lot of the time that's going to make certain people unhappy."

You swallow.

"I have to prioaritize," she says. "It's knot posseable to make everyboaty happy."

"I know," you say. "Fuck, dammit, I know."

"With that said, though. If either of you has a betta idea. Please speak up."

"I wish I did," Aradia says. "And I wish time wasn't of the essence. But I don't, and it is. I don't want any part in this until I'm needed. Tell me when I am."

"I have to talk to the Helmsman before we can do anyfin," Feferi says.

You stand up. "I'm going with you."

\---

"We have information on other power sources that could potentially rival psionic power, or at least be adequate for nightly function if the engineering was right," you explain to him. He returned to his block after he spoke to the library tealblood, which made it easy for you and Feferi to create a quiet environment to talk in. "But the projects were never given as much funding as they should have, because we were funneling all of our resources into expanding psionic power. We're going to put most of the engineers and scienterrorists and researchers who specialize in psionic power onto the development of new power systems."

The Helmsman's brows draw together. You expect a biting comment, but he looks from Feferi back to you and says, "Okay."

"Which then leaves the problem of the psions who have already been conscripted to the power plants, and how to rescue them."

"You don't rescue them," he says. "You wait for them to burn out and gradually replace with the new power systems as they do. Assuming said systems are developed quickly enough, which is a longshot."

You ignore both his cynicism and the way Feferi tenses. "No," you say with as much patience as you can muster. "You don't give up on people."

"They were lost as soon as they were conscripted," he says. "I understand why you don't want to believe that, but death isn't the only way a troll can be ruined beyond repair. Culling them is the merciful option. The vast majority of them won't be anywhere close to functional if they're extracted."

"You're projecting," you point out.

"I was under the impression that our illustrious Empress had learned a thing or two about trying to save people who should not be saved. And yet here we are. Surprise surprise, tyrians with unchecked power continue to give zero fucks."

Feferi bristles. You angle yourself between them before she can reply, because this is already going horribly and you haven't even gotten to the bad part yet. "Calm your cynical ass down. This is a thousand times different from rescuing you from the helm. Unless you have a list of reasons why leaving them imprisoned would be their ideal choice?"

"No. But I could give you a thousand reasons why most of them would prefer mercy culling to rehabilitation."

"Unfortunately it's not your call and you can't throw a temper tantrum every time we make a decision you disagree with, so for now you get to bite your tongue and listen to the rest of this. Okay?"

He glowers, but after a pause he gives a tight nod.

Feferi steps properly back into his line of vision, because she wanted to do this part. Responsibilities as an Empress and all. "The prawnblem with rescuing them," she says, "is first that it'll be slow going given how widespread the plants are, and next that we'll need teems suited to every poseability. A lot of the people will be unstable and have unknown power levels. We won't know what we're swimming into with each cell until we take them out."

"Making this a dangerous and overly complex endeavor that would be a lot easier if you applied the barest hint of logic to the situation."

Feferi breathes out through her nose, steeling herself. "This means," she says, ignoring the jab, "that each rescue team will need at least one powerful psion. Powerful enough to handle every poseability."

Pressure descends on your shoulders, a crackle of psionic power, palpable evidence of his tension.

"Most pyrokinetic and telekinetic class four and five psions are alreedy stationed in ships," she says. "And there's only been a handful of class six psions through all of history. There are people with otter psychic powers who may be suited to the job. But there are few enough that we need help from everyone available."

She pauses. The Helmsman lifts his chin and narrows his eyes, an unspoken challenge. He's already reached the conclusion, you all know he has, but he's going to make her say it.

Feferi bites her lip. "Which includes you. When we leave the colony, you'll need to come with us to work on this whale we finish the galaxsea tour."

Sparks flicker between his horns. "I am staying on the colony when the ship leaves. That was already arranged."

"We need you."

"I won't," the Helmsman says. "I will not be part of a useless project when I have already given my soul to this Empire. I am staying here."

"You will," Feferi replies. The pressure in the room intensifies, bearing down hard on your shoulders. The Helmsman stands frozen and all you can think is this is bad, this is bad, this is bad.

She holds her hands out to him, a gesture of peace. "I'm so sorry. You're the most powerful psionic in the galaxsea. If we want to save them then we need yoar kelp - we need all the kelp available. I have to choose what's best for the people."

"I won't," he repeats. His back is ramrod straight. "I have done more than enough for this world."

"And now we need your kelp to undo it. To get the world to the place it shoald be, like you once wanted."

"Fef," you start, because she's fucking this up, but the Helmsman cuts you off with a sharp laugh.

"Am I being punished for serving the last Empress and being faithful to the exact Empire you inherited, or am I being punished for being a heretic and speaking against it? Choose the sentence. You can't have it both ways, Your Majesty."

"You aren't being punished for anyfin! I know you don't want this, I know it's not fair, I don't know how else to tell you I'm shore-y."

"Don't make me do it! That's all you need to fucking do! Do you have any concept - the scope of a project like this, sweeps upon sweeps, the rest of the time I have left and I deserve to _rest_ " -

"You do, you do deserve to rest." Feferi and the Helmsman are frozen, eyes locked on one another, and she's trying so hard and fucking up so bad, and you need to -

"I just need you to kelp me with this," she says, "and then if you want me to, I can give you back your youth and you can have a whole lifetime on this colony."

His hand shoots out so fast the motion blurs. He's not close enough to strike or even brush her, but that doesn't matter - the force of the psionic power shoves her back and slams her against the wall. Her earfins flare out as she wheezes, scrabbling at her throat, at invisible fingers closing up her gills and crushing her windpipe. When her lips curl back, there's a terrifying second where you see what he does as the seadweller instincts come out, a second where she vanishes and all you're thinking about is Her Imperious Condescension and the wrong end of a culling fork.

"Give me back my youth," the Helmsman says, curling his fingers in the air, watching her with an almost idle fascination. "Let me stay here, mmm, a sweep or two, maybe five if I'm lucky, and then you show up again. Need my help for something else, need to whisk me back into the cosmos, need me to be at your every beck and call, and then give me another chance, pull me back from death again and again and again, always promising, always saying _sorry_..."

Fef tries to speak, but with the pressure on her throat she can't even croak. You lunge forward and grab for his outstretched arm. "Enough!"

His other hand flicks toward you and then you're airborne with a swooping sensation like falling, until you're pressed against the opposite wall. The psionics cancel out gravity like centrifugal force, so you feel like you're pinned to the ground instead of held up. Despite the enormous pressure on your chest, you can still breathe and speak, so you know he has enough presence of mind to control himself.

He bares his teeth in a snarl that perfectly matches Fef's. " _Stay out of this, Sign._ "

You're hyperventilating, your chest heaving as you try to suck in enough air, and you have to do something but how do you - how do you reach him, how do you reach him when he's spitting fire and Fef's face is shot through with tyrian and you don't know what the fuck will happen to this world if she dies -

"Psii, you can't kill her," you say frantically, "her lusus will release the Vast Glub."

"Why should I care about that?" he asks, but the pressure on Fef's throat lessens just enough that you catch the heaving motion of her chest as she gasps. Not enough air to survive, not when she's already oxygen deprived, but -

"Every troll in the fucking galaxy, I know you don't care about dying but I do, I want to fucking live and I know you're angry but you don't want to kill me" -

"We deserve to go extinct," he says. The snarl is gone; his face is eerily calm, like Sollux when he tunes in to the voices and leaves physical concerns behind. "We are a fucking cancer, attacking ourselves and destroying anything healthy or beautiful that crosses our path - every fucking troll in the galaxy deserves to die screaming and end their own pain, we deserve it, we _deserve it_ " -

"Psii" -

Feferi gasps again. Her fingers twitch, in the direction of her trident you think, but her arms are still pinned hard and you can't peel yourself away from the wall to stop Psii by yourself and oh, God, oh God this is really it you've ruined everything -

"You want me to be the bad guy? I will be the _worst motherfucking parasite this world has ever seen._ "

"You're not going to kill millions of children," you say, "you're not that person no matter how much you want to convince yourself you are, I've read the fucking journals, the number of times you did stupid things to keep kids out of trouble, you're not going to kill millions of children" -

His ears and the corners of his mouth turn down. There's a few seconds of breathless hesitation, and then the pressure on your chest disappears and the world turns violently right side up, so you pitch forward and land on your hands and knees. Fef drops to the ground and catches her breath, rubbing at her neck, which is already ringed with purple. You guess it's a good thing her windpipe didn't cave entirely. Seadwellers are made of strong stuff.

"I already did," the Helmsman whispers, and the malice of a minute ago is gone without a trace, leaving behind hollow misery.

Feferi draws herself up and unsheathes her trident so quickly the movement blurs in your eyes, swinging it in a wide arc until the points rest delicately under the Helmsman's chin. The middle tine presses into the soft skin of his throat, an indentation that threatens to break. One shove forward and he'd crumple.

He closes his eyes.

"Do it," he says softly. "Please."

You pull yourself to your feet and throw your body forward, knocking the trident to the side. The spear draws a thin line of gold across his throat, but nowhere near deep enough to kill, and then you're between them like a physical shield, your hands held up.

When Feferi tries to speak, all that comes out is a puff of croaking air, her throat too damaged to manage the sounds. Instead she jerks her head to the side in a clear enough motion. _Get out of the way, Karkat._

You stand your ground and keep your hands up, and you're so high on adrenaline that every serrated breath of air lands sharp in your lungs but the world narrows to this one scene, the Helmsman's warmth behind you and Feferi's half-panicked determination in front and he not only threatened her but the entire species, of course she wants him dead, it makes sense to kill him and when you speak you don't feel very much like Karkat Vantas at all.

_"We don't execute without fair trials."_

Her hand, still curled tightly around the handle of the trident, shakes.

"I'll take care of this," you add, more quietly. "You need to be seen to by a medic."

She tries to speak again, but the croaking noise is painful enough that she gives up and just mouths the words. _Will you be safe?_

"I'll be fine," you say. "Everything's fine, everything's good, hahaha nothing's ever been better go fix your throat holy shit."

She sheathes her trident, pressing a closed fist over her heart. _I'm sorry._

"Go."

You edge around the Helmsman as she crosses to the door, keeping yourself physically between them at all times. When she leaves and pulls it shut behind her, you turn just in time to see him drop to his knees and throw up everything left in his stomach.

"Oh, ew. Fuck." You crouch beside him and place a careful hand between his shoulderblades. He's shaking violently, a body tossed in the middle of a storm, but he doesn't shove you or shy away, so you take that as a cue to begin gently rubbing his back.

"I feel like every time we talk I discover fun new layers to how irrevocably fucked up you are," you say, and he responds with a low moan.

"Shh," you add. "Fuck, I need a blanket or something." After a moment of deliberation, you shrug off your jacket and drape it over his shoulders. "Are you done being genocide happy now?"

A low whine.

"I'm going to take that as a tentative yes. So I'll just wait until you can verbalize again. If we're really lucky then you fucked up Fef's throat bad enough that everyone will be busy repairing her, and we'll have a bit of time before you get your ass arrested."

He slips his hands into the sleeves of the jacket and pulls it tightly around himself, burying his nose into the collar, his eyes closed. You don't move. It's five minutes before his shaking starts to subside, ten before he speaks.

"What did I just do," he whispers.

"That's a rhetorical question, right."

He shudders again, taking a deep breath. "Probably bad form to blame the bipolar, right."

"Yeah, I'm not sure 'mood swing' is going to hold up as a valid defense for 'literally tried to kill everyone.'"

"Oh, God." He retches again, but there's nothing left for him to throw up. "No, no, no, no, no..."

"It's okay. You didn't." You rock back on your heels. "You know what I saw?"

"Don't try to be inspirational right now."

"I saw a black flirtation gone very wrong."

His ears pin flat against his head and his head swivels around, eyes meeting yours. There's still vomit crusted on his chin. "What."

"I saw an intentional black rivalry that escalated far beyond the realms of normal black parameters."

"If you think there was anything _romantic_ to that then you've got..."

"I saw," you say, holding up a hand to silence him, "two people get carried away with violence, which has been known to happen with unhealthy pitch-tinted interactions, and then I auspisticized the conflict. Generally in these kinds of cases, the auspistice is considered a more credible witness than either of the rival parties, regardless of castes involved. _Especially_ when the Empress is trying to push the idea that she is just as accountable as any other troll in the galaxy."

Comprehension dawns across his face. He breaks the eye contact and turns back around, running his hands through his hair. "You're protecting me?"

"I guess I am, yeah. Only to a point, though."

"Why?"

"Because Fef's right. We need you to help us find Sollux."

He drops his head and makes the most miserable sound you've ever heard in your life.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> it happened

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know when you write and the characters refuse to do what you originally meant them to  
> but then you're like "fuck it you guys have been through enough i'll let it stand"  
> that's this entire chapter

The arrest isn't as dramatic as it could be, because there's a lot riding on keeping this quiet. Feferi isn't going to gain political points by making a public enemy of the person who's been painted as a victim of the previous regime. You're not going to gain points for being the person who couldn't keep things from escalating to this point. And the Helmsman has already suffered the ramifications of being branded a traitor once.

The medics fit him with psionic dampeners to be worn until the trial, and there's a lock added to his block on the ship, because imprisoning him in luxury makes him more accessible than throwing him in the brig. Fef's throat isn't permanently damaged - like you said, seadwellers are made of strong stuff, so it's three days before she's speaking again and two weeks before she sounds back to normal. It's harder to hide the dark purple bruising over her skin, but hey, scarves can be in this season.

You can't delay on the colony when you're involved in a project of this scope. It wouldn't be practical to bring their power grid down first, since you need the researchers to have their systems to do their work. No, the first places you'll transfer are the ones that won't suffer so much if there's a blackout.

The Helmsman doesn't argue or fight through any of the proceedings. According to the kitchen staff who keep drawing straws for who has to bring him meals, he doesn't even speak - hasn't spoken since they first brought him through the medbay. "It's smart," a bronzeblooded chef offered. "He can't incriminate himself more if he doesn't talk."

You're pretty sure the Helmsman doesn't give a damn about incriminating himself. The fact that he's not talking is... a bad sign, probably, reminiscent of his first few weeks as a renewed troll. Remembering the first time you spoke to him properly, when he forgot he'd been taken out of the helm at all and thought you were a program set to reward him, makes your stomach hurt.

It's not like you're pursuing a second conciliatory quadrant with him. Things are complicated enough now that you've officially thrown your horn cover into the threshie pit as his auspistice, even though you're pretty sure this is not how auspisticism is meant to work in the first place. Point is, you're just a concerned guy checking up on a quadrantmate, and there is nothing fucked up about this at all.

You unlock his door and step inside, holding your breath, unsure what you're expecting. Something a little more climatic than him wrapped in blankets and curled up on his reclining platform with a thick book, maybe.

He starts when the door closes behind you, looks up and slams the book shut and shoves it under a pillow, which is slightly suspicious behavior.

"What, are you reading porn? I'm sure I've seen worse in my schmaltzy romance novels. Also probably written worse. We were all horny adolescents once."

He doesn't respond.

"Tell me you're not naked under that blanket, at least. Oh my god, please tell me you weren't masturbating."

No response.

"Look," you say, "I know that I'm the last person you want to see, okay? But we need to talk about what's going to happen in the trial. It'll be closed door, no kind of public spectacle, and I know the legislacerator involved. It's not even going to be a trial so much as a mediation with witnesses."

His ear flicks.

"I know you're listening to me, asshole. You aren't catatonic."

A shrug.

"Oh my god. You're worse than Sollux." You move to the couch and pull the pillow away from his book. "Here, I'll just..." and the _put this away_ dies on your lips.

Of course he kept the journal. You're so fucking stupid. How he snuck it onto the ship is beyond you - maybe he had the help of his tealblood friend, she'd probably be willing to make an exception considering the journal is his hatchright and all. You doubt he asked Feferi, since people don't usually ask for favors from trolls they just tried to assassinate, and he doesn't seem to have much else in the way of friends.

The way he crumples inward is the worst thing you've ever seen. He curls in on himself like paper shriveling in a fire, like a barkbeast who's just been caught around the ribs by a sharp-toed boot, his eyes closing.

"Are you going to take it?" he whispers. Not _Don't take it_ or even _It's mine, it's mine, I have a right to it._

"I - no, I - I'm not a fucking monster, holy shit."

"It's illegal to have it."

"And it used to be illegal for me to exist. Keep it. It belongs to you."

He gathers the journal up in his arms, hugs it close, because it's the only thing he has left and you and Fef took everything else that mattered to him so of course he thinks you'd take this from him, to him she's his Empress reincarnated and you're an Empire lackey with no qualms about hurting him and you don't want to think about how that might be true -

"Please don't take it," he says with the tone of someone begging for their matesprit's life, and then he starts to cry, and you take back your earlier thought - this is by far the worst thing you've ever seen.

"I'm..." Okay, you can't do this. Nope. Nope, you can't try to talk politics with the oldest troll in the galaxy while he cries like a wiggler who just found their dead lusus. Nope. Nope! "I'm just going to leave you be, okay? You can contact me when you're ready to talk about how the trial will go. No one will take the journal away from you, I'll make sure of that. I'm - I'm sorry, I'll leave you be."

He reaches out and snags your sleeve, his fingers curling stiffly around the fabric. "Please," he says, and you're going to reassure him about the journal again, but he adds, "Don't leave me."

Oh, god.

"Listen, you're in a really vulnerable place right now and I don't think I should take advantage of..."

"Please. I'm sorry."

Fuck.

You sit beside him and wrap your arms around his waist, and he lays his head on your chest, his horns curving along either side of your jaw. He shakes apart there, the same way you did when you cried on him on the library steps, when you accused him of ruining everything on purpose and this is the sickest role reversal you can think of.

You hold him tight against you, low murmurs of _I'm sorry sorry sorry so sorry_ leaving your lips, resting your chin on top of his head, because this is about a hell of a lot more than the journal and you both know it. He shakes and spasms and cries, making these awful guttual noises that are too weak to be howls but too pained to be sobs and you can't do anything, you can't do anything except murmur sorry sorry sorry and hold him and keep your own tears silent.

This isn't what you wanted from your position. You wanted a chance to make the world better. You wanted to try to be better than other people would be. You did not want to kick a slave until he's so heartshattered he can't do anything except cry. Feferi didn't, either. This is the opposite of what either of you wanted and yet here you are, and you have to face up to your mistakes, and you're not sure there even is any way to make this better. Not now. Not when you've pushed him past his breaking point and you have to keep pushing.

"I'm so sorry," you say for the thousandth time, "so sorry, so sorry, so fucking sorry."

He cries himself out, because you know from experience that you can only shed so many tears before you're too empty to even manage that. You're not sure how to politely disengage from the situation - is there even any way to disengage after this, after all of the bullshit you've put him through - but you solve the problem when he begins to snore quietly. He hasn't slept much lately, you're sure. He _fell asleep on you_.

You untangle the blankets and gather him up in your arms. He doesn't stir, and he's frail, so frail, you've never appreciated how thin he is or the strain his body has been under for thousands of sweeps, and you -

You deposit him in his 'coon and back out of the room. Nope, you're not going to think about this. You are absolutely going to ignore this train of thought forever because that's the best way to make it go away. Yep.

\---

The resolution to never think about this again ever lasts for twelve hours, until you get a notice that the Helmsman has requested you see him. You dare to hope it's just about politics and you can explain the trial process without talking about what happened earlier, but that hope is dashed to pieces when you enter the room and he says, "You're pale for me."

It's not a question, or a hope, or even an accusation. It's just a mild statement of fact. This ship belonged to the Condesce, Feferi is the Empress, Alternia is populated by wigglers, and you're pale for the Helmsman.

"You're pale for Signless," you say.

"Signless is dead."

"I know."

"So do I." He's sitting on the reclining platform, staring over your shoulder at the wall, unfocused. "You aren't him. I am lucid enough right now to recognize that."

"But you aren't always that lucid."

"No, I'm not," he says, and goes quiet.

You stand in awkward silence for the better part of thirty seconds, debating how to continue. Ask about the trial? Ask him what he wants? Ask him what he's thinking? Eventually you settle for, "So with those cards on the table, do we ignore all of this forever, or...?"

"That depends." The Helmsman's gaze shifts to your forehead as he fakes eye contact. You've had enough experience with people dodging you to recognize that he's still not looking at you, not really. "I know what I want. But what I want is selfish, and I am afraid you won't have the strength to refuse it, because you are more easily manipulated than he was and just as empathetic."

"You might as well tell me."

His hand curls into a loose fist. "I'm not going to heal," he says. "Not as I am. Not as these circumstances are. I was a fool to pretend that healing was a possibility. As long as I'm enslaved to this Empire, I'll be broken."

Your throat clicks as you swallow. "I - I'm sorry."

"It's not your responsibility, little one. You need to ally with her to keep the people united and reform the world. I'm not so stupid I can't understand that. That doesn't mean I like it."

"Okay," you say. "So do you want us to go back to not talking? Because I completely understand and I'll fuck off forever if that's what you want."

"No. I wanted you to stay away from me because you were keeping me from healing. But I have enough clarity now to realize that it's not you who is keeping me from healing, it's this whole fucking world. I want my comforts."

"So you want..."

"I want to tell you about my tragedies and look at you as pitifully as I can until you can't help coming here every single fucking day. I want to be so important to you that I gut everything else you care about, and I want to ruin you just as thoroughly as this Empire has ruined me. I want to tear you apart. I want you to hold me and I want you dead." He breathes quietly through his nose. "You have no idea how many times I've thought about killing you. But that won't solve any problems, will it? It just makes us both dead."

Your pusher stutters in your chest, picks up its pace, pan opening and flooding your system with adrenaline. You either need to run or you need to pap him. Somehow "fight" bypassed your instincts entirely.

"You're right that killing me doesn't solve anything," you say.

"I know. My pan can't decide if you're my enemy or not. The only thing I know for certain is that pursuing you is immoral on at least six different levels. I also know that I've stopped caring, but not so much that I won't point it out. Do what you will with this halfassed attempt at decency."

"I'm not sure 'immoral' is the right word," you say. "Generally fucked up, maybe. It would be immoral for me to pursue you."

"How so?"

"There's a power imbalance."

His laugh is grating. "And there isn't a power imbalance in our ages, in my manipulation, in how dangerous I am?"

"I'm not sure you're being manipulative right now." You shrug and pinch the bridge of your nose. "I think you're just being brutally honest. I'm the fucking idiot who isn't running."

"Tell me what you want, little one," he says. "Putting aside obligations you may feel to keep me sane, or obligations you may feel toward me because of your ancestor, or guilt you may feel at the thought of not caring for me. Given what you know about the danger I put you in, and my intentions, and where you stand knowing those things - tell me what you want from this."

"Can I sit down?"

"Of course."

You perch on the arm of the reclining platform, careful not to touch him, hands clasped in your lap. "I need to think."

"I have time."

You close your eyes. Instinct tells you to run. Logic tells you to sever this for both of your sakes, to hide, to throw yourself into politics and quit these ridiculous emotional entanglements. Rationality tells you that you two are not destined to be together, not by a long shot, that you are shadowy imitations of the people you actually want.

But if you both understand that, if you both understand this is a bad idea -- that protects you from the fallout, doesn't it? If you go into this knowing exactly where the other stands, if you don't expect it to last, if it's a temporary arrangement to assuage your guilt and make him happy --

Oh.

"Okay," you say. "When you take away all the circumstances and power imbalances and how twisted this whole thing is, I'm pretty sure I just want you to be happy."

He makes a choking sound, a man who's just been kicked in the chest.

"I'm sorry," you add. "If I had a better answer I'd give it to you. I want you to be happy. I don't want to keep hurting you the way I have been. If that means I leave you alone, I'll do that. If that means I take care of you, I'll do that. Either way, I have no intention of hurting you. You don't have to -- have to be afraid this will be a repeat of what happened with my ancestor. It won't."

"If it is a repeat of what happened with Signless, it will be my fault just like it was the first time." He pulls a blanket over his lap. "I'm going to hurt you. I'm an inherently selfish person and don't care enough to fix it."

"No," you say. "Signless was the selfish one."

"What?"

"You sacrificed everything for what he wanted and you're still suffering for it. I'm not going to repeat that. I've already been repeating that, fuck, trying to get you to side with Feferi and see where I'm coming from and agree with me on everything, I'm not going to -- fuck Signless. I know he was a revolutionary and doing the right thing and that he couldn't have lived with himself if he'd just hidden like a rational person, but fuck him. The cost was too high."

"The way the revolution failed was the Empress' fault, not his."

"Okay, yeah, I know that. Fuck the Condesce too. But he must have known the revolution would fail after a certain point. I mean, I'm sure the broken pity gland didn't know, but he was smart enough to know logically that he was going to lose, and he kept going because he decided he cared more about his morals and the movement than about his family. Someone who wasn't an asshole would have thrown in the towel and gone into hiding. Would it have been cowardly? Yeah, but at least things wouldn't have ended like they did!" You rake a hand through your hair. "You fucking lived the revolution. You can't tell me there weren't times when you wanted to tell him to go fuck himself."

"He gave us all the option to leave. I could have gone any time I wanted to, had I wanted to."

"Well, that makes it all better! Like you were going to leave your moirail and the only family you'd ever had for your own safety! No, you know what the selfless option would have been? If he'd admitted to himself and to you that he wasn't going to leave the legacy he wanted, and then he gave up, and then you all hid on one of the outer colonies and lived long lives. Fuck him. I know he couldn't have known how bad things would be for the rest of you, but he only martyred himself because he was too big a fucking coward to face his own failure, so he left you to face it instead. Fuck him. Fuck him! You didn't deserve what happened to you and what happened to him wasn't your fucking fault. He was the selfish asshole. Stop torturing yourself over his mistakes."

The Helmsman twists his hands up in the blanket. "He was good. He wasn't selfish, he just prioritized differently. The people mattered more to him than anything."

"Anyone can get away with being selfish if they hide it behind a good cause. _Fuck him._ He should have cared more about consequences. He should have cared more about you."

He's silent.

"You gave up fucking everything for him. There's nothing fucking selfish about not wanting to be alone. There's everything fucking selfish about prioritizing your morals above the people you actually care about. Fuck him."

"I loved him so much."

"Yeah, well. I have no intention of being him. What a douchebag."

He lets out a strangled laugh. "I'd fight anyone else who talked about him that way. But I suppose you've earned the right to be critical."

You slide onto the cushions beside him. "I'm tired of hurting you. I keep fucking up. I want to stop fucking up. But I need to know what you need from me. I can't stop fucking up without knowing what you need from me. And I don't blame you for wanting me dead, not with the shit I've been doing to you. So -- your turn. Remove the circumstances and your qualms about my age. What do you want?"

His mouth turns down. "Right now? To touch you."

"Okay. Then touch me."

He reaches over and takes your hand in both of his, uncurling your fingers and tracing his own fingertips over the lines of your palm. "I don't think I'm capable of being happy anymore," he says, pressing his thumb into the heel of your hand. "But I am capable of being comforted."

"I want to comfort you, then."

"Good things are taken away from me. I don't have any left except you and the journal." His breath hitches. "You're going to hurt me."

"No, I'm not."

"Do not make promises you can't keep."

"I'll try my best not to hurt you, at least. Okay? I don't want to hurt you."

He releases your hand and slides his arms around your torso instead, shifting to rest his forehead against your shoulder, body splayed over your lap. You pet his hair, working through the tangles.

"You were the first person on the crew to pay attention to me as more than a nuisance, obligation, or tool," he says.

"I haven't exactly been cozying up to you and extending fronds of friendship."

"No. But you have been kinder than you have any right to be, especially considering everything I've put you through."

"What you've put me through?"

He raises his head, narrows his eyes. "Mistaking your identity, everything to do with Sollux, trying to kill your Empress, trying to destroy our entire species..."

"Okay, okay. You may have put me through a few things."

He drops his head again. "No fucking shit."

You lean back against the cushions, holding him gently. Nothing fancy, just the press of his body against yours, the softness of your hands in his hair.

"I don't blame you," you murmur. "The circumstances that led you to all of this weren't your fault. I couldn't understand why you were fighting so hard to hate Feferi, but after you - after she - you were right. Not about her. She's a good person. She's one of my closest friends and I believe she's a good person. But you were right about the decisions she has to make."

"I shouldn't have tried to kill her."

"That is true."

"I'm sick," he mumbles against your chest.

"I know." You hum. "I know I can't fix it. I know I can't fix what's happening."

"You could, if you fought hard enough. But you won't."

When you tense, he hugs you closer. "It's all right," he says. "I can't be angry at you for it. You have to ally yourself with her. You can't afford to have bad blood between you, and you would if you fought for me."

"I'm fighting for you as much as I can," you say. "I'm going to make sure nothing more happens to you."

"Because you need me to help with the psion project."

"Yeah."

"And because you're pale for me." He sighs. "It's natural not to want your quadrantmates dead. Even if it is selfish."

"I'm so sorry, Helmsman."

"I don't..." He swallows. "I don't want - call me Psii. Please? I don't want to be the Helmsman anymore. Not with you."

"Okay. Psii."

A low purr rumbles in his chest.

"I'm sorry for being selfish. I can at least try to avoid being selfish like Signless. What an asshole."

"I don't want to debate the nuances of selfishness with you. I don't want us to fight right now." He noses against your collarbone. "I'm so fucking tired of fighting you. I'm so fucking tired. This whole existence is exhausting. I just want things to be okay for five minutes."

"Okay. I'll stay with you."

"Thank you." He relaxes in miniscule increments as you rearrange the blanket, draping it over his back.

"This is going to make the whole pseudo auspistice thing really complicated in court."

His shoulders spasm as he lets out a weak rasp of a laugh. "I won't tell if you don't."

"You've got a deal, Psii," you say, and doze against him.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> terezi pyrope saves the day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this miiiight end up being nine or ten chapters instead of eight? i'm not sure yet. we're not quite as close to the end as i intended to be, but i might be able to wrap things up in one more chapter. who knows.

The trial commences as soon as Terezi Pyrope arrives on ship.

"I wanted to apologize again," Feferi says, "for calling you away."

It's the first time you've seen Terezi in a long time. She's clearly in her element - grown into the shark smiles and cackling, so there's an edge of something dangerous in the curve of her mouth as she leans on her cane.

"My pleasure!" she says. "I am just _fascinated_ by all the details of this case. And I get to mess with the lives of my favorite people, too!"

She hooks you around the ankle with the cane, catching you off balance, and yeah, she really hasn't changed at all.

"You remain the absolute worst," you say, straightening up.

"Lighten up, Karkat! That's no way to talk to the person in the unique position of being judge, jury, and executioner."

When you tense, she taps your shin with the cane. "Don't worry. I'm leaning toward no executions, but who knows? I am a fickle person and I love gallows."

"Terezi," you say.

"Stop being so serious. I'm only a serial killer by day, and it's always night in space!" She grins wider. "Show me to the courtblock, we don't have time to waste."

\---

Psii is already in the courtblock when you enter. It's on one of the middle decks of the ship, and designed to be a cross between a business and entertainment area. Feferi told the sanitation crew to scrub out the bloodstains from where justice was swiftly doled out during guilty verdict trials, so the walls and floor aren't as suspiciously discolored as they used to be. The place still unnerves you, though. An open room with chairs lining the side, a raised platform for the accused, and thrones for the Empress and high subjuggulators. You don't like thinking about the "justice" dispensed here.

You're not using the full expanse of the courtroom tonight, though. The platform has four simple chairs on it for now. Psii's sitting in one, looking for all intents and purposes like he hasn't heard you enter. Terezi gestures to the other seats.

"Unfortunately we can't be as dramatic about this as I would like," she says. "There's a tragic lack of flair here. Sit. I assume the security cameras have already been switched off?"

"As far as I know," you say, climbing onto the platform and sitting beside Psii. Feferi settles down on your right, and Terezi takes the seat facing all three of you.

"So," she says, leaning back. "This whole situation is unprecedented, which means we're going to toss convention to the winds. In normal court proceedings of this magnitude, witnesses would be called, more than one legislacerator would be involved, there would be a judge and jury, and the whole process could take perigrees. I understand all three of you have waived your right to that procedure and decided to have me deliberate instead, which is a privilege afforded to me as a Grand High Legislacerator."

"Yes," you and Feferi say. Psii just grunts.

"Which means," Terezi adds, "that verdicts and sentencing all fall on my shoulders, and my shoulders only, with no input from peers or other court members. All three of you need to confirm your consent to this."

"I'm fucked whether I'm tried by one person or ten," Psii says. "Let's just get this over with."

Feferi toys with the end of her braid. "You're the only persean I'd trust to make a fair judgment call. You may be young, but you value justice higher than existing laws, and existing laws higher than those who'd seak to break them."

"Yeah," you say. "What she said."

Terezi smiles. "Which is why I'm a Grand High Legislacerator to begin with! I hope you understand I'm not going to kiss your ass, Peixes."

You feel more than see the tension in Psii at the casual disrespect of Fef's title (like he's the only one allowed to do it? honestly), and resist the urge to pat his shoulder.

Feferi nods. "I know you aren't. That's why I trust you. If I'm wrong, I'll face that."

"Good." Terezi leans forward, hands clasped around the head of her dragon cane. "Let's begin. This trial concerns an event that occurred six weeks ago, as well as the circumstances surrounding that event. The Second Signless is called to witness. The First Imperial Helmsman stands accused of misuse of psionic power, disobedience of direct orders from a superior, attempted murder, attempted genocide, and high treason. The Empress, Her Imperious Reformation, stands accused of political corruption, systemic violence, and egregious misuse of social capital."

Psii raises his head. "Misuse of social capital?"

"A fancy term for using her place on the hemospectrum to mistreat others. And coincidentally my favorite crime to prosecute!" Terezi's continued smile is equal parts benign and dangerous. "Did you think you were the only one in deep shit here?"

"I was not aware Empresses could be prosecuted for their crimes."

"They can when you set a precedent. Now, no criminal records under the last regime are admissible in court. I don't care who you were or who you are. I have a working understanding of the circumstances that led to this incident, but I want to know what happened from you three. I expect questions to be answered with total honesty. And don't waste my time with lies. I can smell deception."

It's safe to say that when you were six sweeps old, you never envisioned this as your future. You never really expected to live this long, let alone end up between an Empress and the most powerful psionic alive, staring down your childhood best friend while she lays down the law. Terezi's almost glowing with satisfaction, sweeps of study and roleplay and adventure all come down to this, and you - you're a little overwhelmed by the sheer importance of it all. How did so many of your friends end up so integral to this world? Was it luck, skill, destiny?

"Second Signless," Terezi says, since apparently she's bothering with titles now, because going by the book matters to her. "Explain what happened during the alleged assassination attempt."

You've practiced this before, almost tripping on the words as you say them. It all sounds too rehearsed, but you doubt Terezi gives a fuck. "The Empress is spearheading a movement to release the psions currently imprisoned in Empire power plants. The project requires help from free psions to minimize potential accidents. There's an inadequate number available, so she needed to pool all available resources, so she drafted the Helmsman back into service. He had already been promised retirement and did not take the conscription well."

"'Did not take it well' meaning?"

"He and the Empress have been waxing pitch for each other for as long as I've known them both. It hasn't been good for either of them. I should have intervened before this happened. They both kept raising the stakes of their antagonism. He took the draft as a new slight and retaliated by choking the Empress. I got between them and defused the situation. I would be very surprised if it happened again."

"Mmm." She taps the cane against the ground. "Helmsman."

Psii looks up. "Yes?"

"Were you trying to kill the Empress when you choked her?"

A pause. "Yes."

You wince.

"And were you aware that in the absence of an Heiress, the death of an Empress is likely to cause the mass extinction event known as the Vast Glub?"

"I wouldn't know," Psii says. "After all, we've never been without a blessed tyrian to guide us."

"Were you aware of the possibility?"

"Yes."

"And this didn't deter you?"

"It did when Karkat reminded me. I stopped. No one's dead, which I think is the main focal point here."

"Why did you try to kill her?"

"Excuse me?"

"Explain your reasoning."

"The reasoning is irrelevant," Psii says. "I'll confess to the crimes I'm accused of. I committed all of them. I believe that concludes my involvement in this trial."

"It most certainly does not. The reasoning is relevant if the court deems it relevant, and the court does indeed deem it relevant!" Terezi sniffs pointedly in his direction. "You smell like discomfort."

"Probably because I am uncomfortable."

"Because of the Empress' presence?"

"No. I don't give a fuck if I offend her." Psii shrugs. "I am uncomfortable pretending my reasoning is an excuse. This trial is about whether or not I committed the crimes in question. The answer is yes. Sentence me how you will and don't overcomplicate things."

"Actually, in this particular proceeding, the reasoning behind your actions matters very much. Answer the questions or you'll be found in contempt of court. Why did you try to kill the Empress?"

"I was mildly perturbed."

"Mildly perturbed."

"Yes. I try to murder people whenever they inconvenience me. Just last week one of the kitchen staff forgot to bring grubsauce with my meal so I singed his eyebrows off."

" _Psii_ ," you hiss.

"Helmsman," Terezi says, "I can't help you if you won't take this seriously."

"You have no intention of helping me in the first place. I've given you everything you need to convict me and acquit the Empress. It's a clean case. I will not make myself vulnerable to you so that you can play the hero." He stands, his shoulders stiff. "If you have no further lines of questioning for me, I'll be in my respiteblock. Feel free to hold me in contempt of court. The door already locks me in."

Terezi's eyes narrow. "Go," she says. "If I need you again I'll call you back."

Psii steps down from the platform, strides to the courtblock doors, and slams them behind him.

Well. That could have gone better.

"Huh," Terezi murmurs. "Sollux really does take after him, doesn't he."

"I'll say." You rub your eyes. "But I thought we were being deeply professional and impersonal about this."

"Of course." She snaps her attention to Feferi, the ever-present grin reappearing. "So! Empress! I'll be questioning you now. I hope you'll be more forthcoming in your answers."

"I intend to be, yes." Feferi straightens up, folding her hands in her lap.

"Why do you believe the Helmsman tried to kill you?"

"He was upset."

"And why was he upset?"

"I can't speak to what he was thinking. I'm naut a mind reeder."

"Fair." Terezi hums. "You conscripted the Helmsman for an increased term of service."

"Yes."

"After promising him retirement."

"I needed to."

"You conscripted him after discovering he'd turned your previous matesprit, Sollux Captor, in for treason, resulting in Sollux's placement in one of the plants you seek to dismantle."

You bristle. "You said actions under the last regime were irrelevant."

"Criminal records and actions under the last regime are irrelevant to my ruling. However, information that may have influenced the Empress is vey relevant."

"You didn't ask a question," Feferi says. She's poised like ice, the way she looked just before she went to fight her ancestor, refusing to fidget or show uneasiness. Less the childhood friend you've known for sweeps and more what she is - a queen.

"Did you conscript the Helmsman to get revenge for what he did to Sollux?"

Fef's jaw twitches as her teeth clench. "No."

"The Helmsman sacrificed your matesprit's mind, freedom, and likely life. After discovering this information, you conscripted him for an unspecified term of service, rescinding earlier promises of freedom. He responded with an assassination attempt. When you conscripted him, was revenge a deciding factor?"

You smell a trap.

"No," Feferi says. "And I thought aboat it to be shore. I went over the numbers. We need him for the project. I'm shore you've sean the numbers too. If we didn't need to pool all available reshoreces, I wouldn't have broken my promise."

"Hmm," Terezi says. "Interesting."

You know she's waiting for one of you to ask, and you know Feferi's too guarded to ask, and you know it's going to throw off Terezi's whole dramatic vision if someone _doesn't_ ask, and tonight isn't a good night to be antagonistic. So you roll your eyes and say, "What's interesting."

"I'm glad you asked!" Shark grin. "Were this situation truly pitch flirting gone too far, the Empress would certainly have considered revenge a motivator. She may also have considered the Helmsman's continued enslavement a fair ploy to keep him close to her."

You don't miss Fef's minuscule flinch, and you doubt Terezi does either as she continues, "Such an action would have been completely inappropriate, of course. It's considered bad form to bring social capital into a pitch relationship - or at least it should be! And the Helmsman's response, while extreme, would have been a logical way of attempting to even out the rivalry. You came at him with loss of freedom and he came at you with loss of life." She crosses her legs, taps the cane against the floor again. "But unfortunately, I don't believe pitch flirting was what was happening there. I believe something much bigger and more interesting than an unhealthy romance was at play!"

When neither of you respond, she cackles. "You both smell so tense. Why? Now that we've established you're full of shit, we can get to the meat of the issue."

"If this is about the meat of the issue, you've already gotten to it," you snap. "You got the Helmsman's confession."

Terezi laughs again, though this is less a cackle and more genuine delight. "Oh please. Assassination attempts are boring. The real issue here is much more complex, and much more fun." Her attention snaps back to Feferi. "What precedent did you call upon to conscript the Helmsman?"

Feferi blinks. "Preseadent?"

"Yes. Your legal recourse. I assume you had one."

A pause. "An Empress' legal right to conscript her citizens, particularly in times of trouble."

"I see. A right excised copiously by the last Empress."

"A right excised by every Empress."

"Yes, of course. But what's interesting is that you would continue excising this right even while your politics are built around promotion of hemoequality. Some may ask how an Empress can be equal to her citizens if she continues to excise the right to enslavement unhindered."

Feferi nods. "Some might," she says. "But I suppose that's where the courts come into play."

In a flash of painstaking clarity, you understand what's happening. You've been so focused on keeping the brunt of the crimes off of Psii's back - and what a waste, like he wasn't going to immediately sabotage any effort you made - that you haven't taken the other half of the proceedings into account. Prosecuting an Empress sets a precedent, shows that everyone has to answer for their actions regardless of caste.

Convicting an Empress sets another.

"Oh my god," you murmur. "You brilliant bastards."

"Hmm?"

"You've known how you're going to rule since before you stepped into the courtroom, haven't you?"

Terezi's teeth gleam. "I needed to speak to the parties in question first to hammer out the details. But any good legislacerator has her opponent's cards memorized as well as her own."

Feferi's voice echoes in your mind. _I trust you. If I'm wrong, I'll face that._

She's throwing herself to the wolves so that she won't have to hold all the power herself. So that any future Empress _can't_ hold all the power herself.

Psii was never the one on trial.

"You..." You draw in a breath. "You're both geniuses."

"What actually happened with the assassination attempt is of very little interest to me," Terezi says. "That's why a closed door hearing is important. I hope you both understand that. The circumstances matter much more than the actions."

"Yes," Feferi says. "I know."

"Is there anything else I should know?"

"I truly am trying to do what's best for the people," Feferi says. "Please take that into conseaderation. And be fair. To both of us."

"I intend to be." Terezi stands up. "If you please, Empress, I'd like to talk to your witness one-on-one. I'll call you back if any further questions arise."

"Of coarse." Feferi smiles, soft and more at peace than she's looked in a long time. "Thank you very much for yoar service."

When the door closes behind her, you slump in your chair. "Holy shit."

"You're right that this is much more about the Empress than it is about the Helmsman." Terezi's posture relaxes, now that it's just the two of you. "But with that said, I need to ask you about him. As his moirail you're qualified to answer the questions he won't."

"Wh..."

"Don't try to bullshit me, Karkat. I could smell pale on both of you the second you sat down. You can waste my time or you can help me."

You sigh and surrender. "I guess it doesn't matter, since you threw out the auspistice defense."

"Precisely! So, your moirail." She's not smiling anymore, which sets your teeth on edge. "How stable is he?"

"Stable?"

"You said you were confident this wouldn't happen again. I caught a whiff of dishonesty."

"This won't happen again as long as he has me."

"Karkat," she says, softer. "Please don't mistake the flavor of this trial. The court may decide to skirt over his actions, but that doesn't make them any less serious. Not because he tried to kill the Empress, but because he tried to kill at all."

You swallow.

"I need you to make a tough judgment call here, because in this circumstance I trust your judgment more than my own. Will more blood be spilled if he lives?"

"What, no."

"If he lives, and has access to all the freedoms of a troll without a criminal record," she says, enunciating each word clearly, "is he going to kill?"

"No!"

"Karkat. I need you to think about it carefully."

"You're asking me to decide about whether my fucking _moirail_ will be _executed_ , no, fuck that, fuck that, I'm not putting up with this. If you really need to make a judgment call about that then you do it yourself, I'm not risking his blood on my hands."

"Because you're the only one who's ever had to consider the merits of their moirail's death."

Your heart skips a beat and you feel your face go ashy as your stomach swoops. "I..." Oh fuck, you're an asshole. "Fuck, I'm an asshole."

"Not to worry. I am used to your particular brand of insensitivity!" Her grin is just a quick flash before she's serious again. "It's very important for you to consider this carefully."

"I can't. I can't, I can't - I'm not strong like you, Terezi."

"Fuck you, Karkat," she says pleasantly. "Killing your moirail has nothing to do with strength. Not the previous Empire's idea of strength, not this one's, and certainly not any personal definition. It's a shitty thing to have to do and doesn't stop being a shitty thing to have to do because you couch it in platitudes about strength or duty."

"Terezi, I can't."

"You'll have to make harder decisions than this in the future."

"I know! Do you think I don't fucking know that?" You stand up, shoving your chair back. The legs screech against the floor tiles. "Do you think I don't know fixing this Empire means making shitty decisions about hellish situations until I fucking die? Do you think I don't know I'm going to be responsible for people's deaths, for potential wars, for potential genocides? Do you think I don't feel that weight all the fucking time like I have every single individual in this Empire piled on top of my shoulders?" You clench your fists. "This is one shitty decision I won't make, this is a shitty thing I won't do. It's not practice for the harder things. It's just shit. I never wanted this much power and I won't toss on yet another thing to feel guilty about."

Terezi stays seated through the entire tirade, face impassive. "Unfortunately," she says as you stop, your chest heaving, "the court compels you to."

"Fuck you!"

"All I want is your honesty. The court will do the rest. The verdict is not on your shoulders." She sighs, blowing a strand of hair out of her face. "And for what it's worth, I meant what I said about leaning toward no executions. I'd love to get through one trial without spilling blood myself, much as I love the gallows. I just need to know if it's necessary."

"It's not. Killing him isn't necessary." You pause and evaluate the words, and then nod in self-affirmation, because you're sure they're true. "The assassination attempt was spur-of-the-moment. He was upset and saw Her Imperious Reformation as Her Imperious Condescension, and he reacted badly. He hates her, but not enough to try to kill her again. He's too smart for that. And as for his stability - you can't convict him of murders he hasn't committed yet. He would never have been able to do so much damage to Feferi if it wasn't for his psionics. If he loses control of those, he could rip this whole ship apart from the inside out. But Sollux had the same potential. You can't kill people for having too much psychic power. Or, well, you could, but we've already lost a caste to that."

"Okay." She nods. "That's all I needed to know, and surprisingly wise."

"I've been studying."

"So have I."

"I can tell."

"We're not doing too badly, are we?" She stands up and grips your hand. "We're a little bit badass."

"Yeah," you agree, and finally allow yourself a small smile of your own. "We are."

\---

The verdicts are delivered in the presence of more witnesses. All of Feferi's council, a few journalists, whichever crew members decide they care enough to watch, and a camera to broadcast to whoever else wants to see.

Terezi braces both hands on her cane, flashing the trademark shark smile at everyone in the room, almost as though she can see them. Feferi and Psii sit across from each other at a long table, the council members populating the rest of the seats. You stand between them and the common audience at the side of the room, angled so you can see both of their faces.

"The court calls for order," she says, poised at the head of the table, within arm's reach of both the defendants.

Silence falls immediately over the room.

"I ask that the audience stay quiet until court officially adjourns. Onto business. A reading of the criminal charges for those uninformed. The First Imperial Helmsman stands accused of misuse of psionic power, disobedience of direct orders from a superior, attempted murder, attempted genocide, and high treason. The Empress, Her Imperious Reformation, stands accused of political corruption, systemic violence, and misuse of social capital."

Psii stares at the table, his hands clenched into fists in front of him, shoulders so tense you're surprised the tendons don't tear. He told you to fuck off when you knocked on his door and asked to be let in earlier, and Terezi didn't spend long enough deliberating for you to convince him things were okay. You weren't even sure how you would regardless - he's only ever had the law working against him. Traditional Alternian courts leave no room for a defense. The concept of the law as a dispensary for real justice rather than a scapegoat for those in power has never occurred to him, but then, he doesn't know Terezi.

"First, on the matter of the criminal charges leveled against the First Imperial Helmsman. On the charge of attempted murder, the court finds the defendant not guilty. On the charge of attempted genocide, the court finds the defendant not guilty. On the charge of high treason, the court finds the defendant not guilty."

There's an outraged gasp from someone at the table, but you can't tell who.

"On the charge of disobedience of direct orders from a superior," Terezi continues, "the court finds the defendant not guilty. On the charge of misuse of psionic power, the court finds the defendant guilty. The defendant will continue to wear psionic dampeners for a term of no less than six perigrees, at which point the court will reevaluate the defendant's stability."

Psii raises his head, blinking slowly, like he's waking from a long nap. The confusion on his face is equal parts funny and pitiful, and you want to go to him, cup his face in your hands and tell him _shh, see, it's over, it's over, it's over._

A low murmur starts from the back of the room, sweeping toward the front. Terezi holds her hand up. "Court has not yet been adjourned!"

An uneasy silence settles back over the crowd.

"On the matter of the criminal charges leveled against Her Imperious Reformation. On the charge of political corruption, the court finds the defendant not guilty. On the charge of systemic violence, the court finds the defendant guilty. On the charge of misuse of social capital, the court finds the defendant guilty." A pause, as the shock settles. You doubt anyone expected a guilty verdict. Trying an Empress is good for the appearance of social equality. Convicting one is the only thing that proves she's truly fallible. 

"The Empress may not nonconsensually compel Empire citizens to her will without the oversight of the courts. Matters of required labor and contracts now fall to the court, rather than to the trolls who contract the labor. Labor contracts can and will be negotiated by both the contractor and the contractee. Trolls who have been nonconsensually compelled to labor under this leadership or the previous leadership have the right to fight their servitude in court."

This is met with outraged yells from at least three people at the table (of course, of course, they don't want to give up their slaves), and a renewed murmur from the crowd of common trolls. Terezi holds up her hand again. "Did I say court was adjourned? No, I didn't. So shut up."

It takes longer for the noise to settle down this time, and you frown. She's already delivered verdicts on the criminal case, what more is there to do?

"Onto civil matters," she says, and you try to keep your face impassive, but you have no idea where this is going.

"On the matter of the First Imperial Helmsman against the Empire, the court rules in favor of the First Imperial Helmsman. For every sweep of service aboard the Battleship Condescension, the Helmsman will be compensated in five times the amount of an average captain's salary to cover labor and physical and emotional damages. The total amount comes to no less than four billion caegars."

She's smirking. Psii blinks again, staring at her, like he still can't quite grasp what's happening. "The Empire thanks you for your service, and the court apologizes for the damage you've sustained," she says. "In addition, all unpaid labor under this leadership or the previous leadership, by any troll, will be compensated in five times the amount of that labor's designated worth. All trolls who perform labor for another are entitled to wages, and those who have fair wages withheld may fight their superiors in court."

Psii's mouth opens, but no sound comes out.

"Anyway! While the Helmsman is still speechless, onto the matter of the First Imperial Helmsman against Her Imperious Reformation, regarding his continued conscription. The court rules in favor of the First Imperial Helmsman, but also notes the circumstances regarding the conflict. Because the freedom of the Empire's psions is so important, and because of the minimal resources for achieving that freedom, the First Imperial Helmsman is contracted to work with the Empire on psion rescue for one Alternian solar sweep."

You wince.

"However," Terezi continues, "the Helmsman will not be required to perform labor on any task unrelated to psion rescue, and will be compensated for his help. At the end of one solar sweep, the Helmsman is to be released from his contract with unconditional freedom from the Empire, regardless of the state of the Empire or the desires of the Empress. He will be free to pursue any interests or livelihoods he desires, and will never be contracted for Empire-related labor again. Again, the Empire thanks you for your service."

Psii's mouth is still open. Meanwhile Fef smiles, serene, her body relaxed.

"As an additional note, the nonconsensual use of any psychic power by any troll, regardless of caste, status, or wealth; on any other troll, regardless of caste, status, or wealth; will be punishable in a court of law, up to and including execution. And any troll who withholds wages from their laborers or nonconsensually compels labor without the oversight of the courts will be subject to punishment up to and including removal of lands and titles, removal of wealth, and exile. This includes the Empress, and any future Empress, who may have her crown removed if found by the court to be uncooperative with the law."

The room is dead silent. Terezi smiles. "That is all. Court is adjourned."

Everyone explodes into sound at once, voices chattering and processing and shouting questions. In the midst of this, Feferi stands and glides toward the door, still smiling. This is what she's been waiting for, you realize. This is what she's needed. Someone to check her power, a system in place to keep her from becoming the Condesce. She doesn't have to struggle with the decisions alone anymore, because the law is no longer in her pocket.

Terezi watches the chaos like a reigning goddess of destruction, and you bolt to Psii's side.

The rest of the advisers are standing, stretching, stomping out of the room, but he's still sitting in stunned silence. You hook your fingers under his chin and tilt his face up, not even caring about the witnesses, not giving a fuck. "Hey. Don't go catatonic on me."

"Did she just..." His voice is hoarse. "Did she just end slavery?"

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's what just happened."

His hands are shaking. "She freed me."

"Yeah, that definitely happened too."

"She - she's only one person, she - can she even do that? Does she even have that legal power?"

"Terezi isn't the kind of person to ask if she can do something. She just does it. And since the Empress will stand by the verdicts, there isn't much anyone else can do."

"But she..." His whole body is shaking now, even as his tone goes softer, wondering. "She freed me."

"Yeah," you say, and give into the temptation to gather him up in your arms, clutching him close.

"Yeah," you repeat, burying your face against his shoulder as he balances on unsteady legs. "You won."


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> righteous fury and preaching: karkat edition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "BUT I'M NOTHING LIKE SIGNLESS" karkat insists  
> okay son
> 
> anyway yeah this is gonna be nine or ten chapters. i swear i'm going to try to wrap it up in the next chapter but. we'll see.

"...And now I'm going to take questions, much as listening to other people talk instead of myself pains me. Try not to be heinously stupid about them, I'd like to have to flex my pan a little bit. I'm tossing out any questions about my qualifications or my mutation on principle. Yes, I know what I'm doing. Yes, my blood is red, in case the red on the outfit didn't clue you in. Now."

You're doing a press conference, and you're going to whine about it to Psii later, but if you're being honest you're having great fun. Nothing like yelling at journalists who are getting paid to hang onto your every word. This part of being Important actually isn't so bad. Sure, the questions are irritating, and a fair chunk of people in here think you're a traitor, but you get to _yell_ at them. And you get to rehash everything that happened at the trial in layman's terms, so you get to shout it from the metaphorical rooftops - slavery is over! The Empress is not a dictator! Life is good.

You call on an oliveblood toward the back. She stands up. "Is it true that you're quadranted to the First Imperial Helmsman?"

"Well, the correct answer to that question is, 'It's literally no one's fucking business.' But since people are going to keep asking until I answer, yes. I am. Pale. Anyone who tries to pry for details about our relationship will be summarily tossed on their ass far outside the confines of this sorry room."

You point at another reporter, but the oliveblood pipes up again. "A followup - did your moirallegiance influence the not guilty verdicts in his criminal charges?"

You breathe out quietly through your nose and will yourself not to clench your fists. "The Grand High Legislacerator dispensed justice as it was meant to be dispensed regardless of my romantic affiliations."

So much for keeping this quiet. Terezi managed to turn a case that could have torn the Empire apart (Empresses in danger! Slaves dissenting! Lies in the government! Tyranny!) into a case with... equally chaotic, but much more positive-leaning results. What was expected to be a clean-cut deal -- worthy of gossip and curiosity and a bit of horror -- has instead shaken the Empire to its roots. As such, you're getting a lot of attention. Most of it is less than positive, but hey. You were hatched ready to fight.

You point to a bronzeblood in the second row, who asks, "If there was nothing to hide from the public then why was the hearing about the charges done with no witnesses, behind closed doors, with only one deliberator? Some people theorize that the Empress was threatened."

"I was a witness," you snap. "The Empress was not threatened."

"Then why won't she appeal her conviction to the other courts?"

"Oh my fucking god." You rub your eyes. "You guys love the new 'no culling the journalists' policy way too much. That's a joke, by the way. I know it's hard to tell because I lost the ability to laugh after a tragic accident in my wigglerhood. That's another joke."

"You're dodging the question."

"Listen. Oh my fuck. I can't believe I -- oh, for fuck's sake, I'm about to preach at you all. I can literally feel the word vomit crawling up my protein chute like a round of undercooked cluckbeast. The entirety of my delicate mutant constitution is suffering. Turn on your recorders if you haven't yet because when I get started I'm incapable of shutting the fuck up, and this is important."

Your ancestor would tell the truth. His whole problem was telling the truth in a world that didn't want to listen to him. You're being afforded an opportunity that he never had, because this world wants to listen, this world _has_ to listen, and trolls aren't in danger of being culled for hearing your words. You need to play your politics, the politics are always important, but with something this big you don't think you'll be able to shut people down with anything except honesty.

"I am not as big a chute fisting flaccid puppet as some of you would believe," you say, "and I am also not as big a diabolical traitor as some of you would believe. I'm almost always pissed off, that's true, but I'd like to think it's for the right reasons. You think that because my ancestor was involved in an ancient war, I have heretic blood in my veins. You think that because I'm close to the Empress, I'm undeserving of my position and just a figurehead to pacify dissenting lowbloods. You think that because I'm close to the Helmsman, I'm a traitor who's secretly plotting how to hold Her Imperious Reformation hostage. The many headed mass of you, and your networks, and every troll who reads what you print, and every troll who hears about what you print, all have a thousand different opinions and theories about me. You all think that you can guess who I am and who the Helmsman is and who the Empress is and what this regime change means for you, so rather than leave you to increasingly inaccurate guesswork, I'm just going to tell you."

You take a deep breath, curling your fingers around the podium. "If believing the Empress' power should not be absolute is heresy, then I am unapologetically a heretic. If believing religion should be a tool of faith and comfort rather than a tool of terror to pacify the masses makes me a heretic, then I am unapologetically a heretic. If believing that slavery is not only immoral but _fucking evil_ makes me a heretic, then I am unapologetically a heretic. If believing a one-person government is fundamentally unsustainable is heresy, then I am unapologetically a _fucking heretic._ "

You're shaking with the intensity, the need to get the words out before you're interrupted warring with the need to slow down and explain clearly. Your chest burns, voice rising higher. "But here's the thing! Being a heretic isn't treason anymore, because Her Imperious Reformation happens to be a heretic too! This Empire is no longer run by Her Imperious Condescension. It no longer has her fingerprints all over it. She's no longer dragging tainting fronds over every single aspect of your lives, and you can't even tell how good this is, because you've lived with the combined terror and adoration of her for a hell of a lot longer than I've been alive, so all of your base knowledge is centered around _fundamentally flawed concepts_. Which means that I don't even know where to begin, holy fuck I never gave my ancestor enough credit for how difficult this is."

You pause, take a sip of water, formulate your thoughts. At the very least, no one's interrupting you.

"You have been raised in a world," you say quietly, "where you have been taught over and over that your Empress is a goddess, the pinnacle of troll perfection, someone who should not be questioned because she cannot make mistakes. You have been raised in a world where this Empress could use her power to create an unsustainable environment and run it unquestioned. You have been raised in a world where the only threat to her power could be another Heiress, thanks to her lusus. She used this opportunity to create power imbalances that forced people on the bottom to keep fighting each other, highbloods to sabotage each other for political gain, and no one to look up and realize what she was doing. She used the threat of mass extinction to solidify herself as a deity and make our lives miserable for thousands of sweeps.

"And when I say that world is unsustainable, I mean it. Yes, we haven't gone extinct. But that is not even close to a measure of sustainability. Under the rules of the last Empress, we see the following: Lowbloods are starving and abused by those with more social capital. The Empress accrues more and more wealth from every planet she conquers, expands the Empire's reach as she teaches her citizens that nothing is more important than power and conquest. She taught those ideals because to her nothing was more important than power and conquest, because she was empty inside and trying to fill the void. All the wealth and power in the world means nothing to our species if we're enslaving our own, using our fellow citizens as fuel cells, breaking the backs of lowbloods and trapping highbloods in political games with no possible winners. Do you hear me? Do you understand that? Conquest means fucking nothing! We have nothing to show for it! We have an extinct caste, millions of people burning out, millions more folding under the pressures of conscription, and a species as a whole that has been crying out for mercy for as long as anyone can remember!

"Don't you understand that? Our whole world is built around making you miserable, and no one can stand against it because of the threat of mass extinction -- don't you understand how wrong that is? Our whole world is built around catering to the whims of an Empress and an elite few who will never be satisfied regardless of how much gold they have and how much blood they spill. And it's bullshit! It's fucking bullshit! The Condesce ripped any hope our species had of healing in two and spat on the pieces, and then told you to kiss her feet because your continued existence was a product of her mercy!"

You slam your palm on the podium, the sound picked up by your microphone and echoing around the crowd, amplified in the dead silence. A few people jump.

"We can't let that happen again. I don't know how many times I'm going to have to say that before people start to understand. The only adequate government is one that serves its citizens, rather than existing to be served by its citizens. The Empress is a troll exactly like any other troll, regardless of fins or blood color or lusus. She's a troll. She's a person with flaws. She's a _troll_ , not a goddess, and the only reason she wields this much power is because of a happy accident of hatching."

You... think you might be winding down. You hope you're winding down. "Her Imperious Reformation thinks that system is bullshit, just like I do. She has never intended for her rule to be hers alone. Who knows? In another life, she might have. But she has seen the damage that absolute power does to society and to a person. She is a troll, and my Empress, but more than that she's my friend. She was my friend when she was still the Heiress and all the odds were stacked against us. We were friends when we were both heretics ready to face the end of a culling fork, and we remain friends now that we're on top of the social food chain. She wields her power with grace, and tries to wield it for good, but it's become very clear since her ascension that the only way to keep her power from corrupting her is by taking that power away."

You're still shaking, but when you pause for another drink of water, the room remains silent. "She did not intend to fill the shoes of the last Empress, thank fate for letting her live, and let the world continue as it always has. She intended to bring about a fucking revolution. We thought that good intentions would be enough. We thought that if she molded the world to what she wanted it to be, then the world would be good and all of our problems would be solved. But there's more to it than that. There is a systemic problem, a structural imbalance. The Empress cannot serve the people if her actions can't be challenged. The Empress cannot be regarded as infallible. The Empress cannot be considered perfect, because Her Imperious Condescension wanted to be perfect, and she fucked everything up more irrevocably than I think anyone ever could.

"I only regret that it's taken this long to figure out what to do, and I regret what happened to the people who were hurt in the process. The Helmsman was among them. If you're asking if there was some closed door conspiracy, the answer is yes. But you're envisioning the conspiracy wrong. The Empress was not blindsided and threatened by the hearing. The Empress engineered it, because she does not want to hold this power herself, because she wants a government that is representative of the people. Some of you will write that she's weak or a coward because of that. But the truth is, she's a thousand times stronger than the Condesce. It takes a special kind of courage to own a galaxy and give that power up."

You pause for a moment, wondering if you've said too much, but the words are already out. There's no room for self doubt. "The Helmsman deserves restitution for his suffering. So does every single troll who's been a victim of this Empire. I will not stand by and watch people be oppressed because it's easy. I will not waste perigrees and sweeps playing political games while the people who need me most fall by the wayside.

"And as a final note, the Empress is far from powerless. She still likely has more power than any one individual should have. It's going to take a long time to draw lines where the courts have power, where she has power, and where other representatives have power. It's going to take a long time to restructure our systems, and it's going to take a long time to help this world heal. I'm not so naive I can't understand that. But we're not only making this world better for the people, we're making it created by the people. That's the best I think we can do. Will uprooting the systems be chaotic? Yeah, and it will come with its fair share of confusion, and people's lives are going to change. But they're going to change for the _better_ , and regardless of how pissy the other people in power are, the Grand High Legislacerator's decisions were sound ones. It's because of that that the Empress and I stand with her, not because the Empress is being puppeteered against her will."

You think you've covered everything. God, you hope you've covered everything. "Any other questions?"

Hands go up again, albeit a hell of a lot more hesitantly. You call on a cobaltblood toward the back.

"Many trolls are pledging not to uphold the verdicts and precedents set by the Grand High Legislacerator, even within the court systems themselves. How do you propose to combat such blatant dissent?"

Oh, thank fuck. A question not based around assumptions that you're a traitor. Does this mean you've cleared the air?

"Well, first of all, the slave owners and captains pissed about paying recompense for their part in oppression can suck the fattest part of my ass. I don't care that slavery was legal, and I don't care that they're mad they have to pay damages, and I don't care if their feelings are hurt by the current political climate. The slaves were a thousand times more hurt and are worthy of being paid for their service. Not only worthy, but entitled to it."

The cobalt opens his mouth again, so you hold up your hand. "But I know that doesn't answer the question. We aren't going to cull the court members who refuse to uphold the law, if anyone was wondering. But court members who refuse to uphold the law as it stands will be subject to removal from their positions. They had no problem catering to the whims of the last Empress, and should not have any problem complying with their High Legislacerator. When the courts are less full of blistering fuckhats, the path to compensation will be easier to follow. I am aware this process will take a long time as well. You would be better off asking the Grand High Legislacerator about the nuances of the legal rhetoric and discourse the next time she's available for public comment, as I'm not exactly fluent in legalese. And thank you for asking a question that didn't make me want to erupt from this podium and rocket away propelled by nothing but a cloud of my own indignant fart power."

You tilt your head. "Oh, as an additional note, you guys should print that I'm getting fed up with the death threats. If people could stop sending them, that would be awesome. It's fucking irritating getting followed around everywhere by a security detail."

\---

Psii wraps his fingers through yours as soon as you leave the conference room.

"We've graduated to egregious displays of public affection now?" you ask.

"I do not like the amount of danger you're currently in," he says. "I like being functionally defenseless in the face of it even less. I can put up with the dampeners given that they ease the fear of waking up from a day terror and incinerating you, and I'm sure I could blow them up if I concentrated hard enough, but I don't like it."

"Okay," you say, "but if I get shot, I'm not sure holding my hand is going to stop the bullet."

"It makes me feel better."

"Okay." Fair enough. You squeeze his fingers.

"There's news, too. I wanted to wait for you to finish talking to the journalists before I told you."

"News?" The carefully neutral tone to his voice sets your teeth on edge, which is the opposite of what you're sure he intended. "What news?"

"With the psion project. We've discovered that many of the power plants have security feeds from psions being accounted for, retrofitted, and incubated. The feeds aren't saved to any network and are heavily classified, which was why it took a while to discover their existence. And they may not help very much in the long run. But available footage is being collected and analyzed, and if it's detailed enough to run facial recognition software..."

Your pusher skips a beat. "We can find Sollux?"

"I was going to say we can build a database of lost identities and match them to the appropriate trolls in the appropriate plants, and create teams uniquely suited to the power levels and needs of each rescued troll. And also, yes. It's possible the film will be too grainy to pick anything up, and possible that he wasn't captured on film at all, but yes. It's also possible that we can find Sollux."

"Oh my god. How - how - how long is it going to take to collect and run through all the film?"

"I have no idea. Longer than I'm sure you're hoping, but short enough to matter. The Empress is currently delegating just about every high clearance troll with any semblance of tech competence to this. She's rather anxious to find him as well."

You catch a hint of continued distaste in his voice and squeeze his hand again. "Oh my god," you say. "Oh my god. Is it wrong for me to be really - is it wrong for me to want to prioritize that above literally everything else, is it wrong for me to want the first plant we visit to be his."

"No. It's natural." When you glance up at his face, he's just barely smiling. "Conveniently enough, Sollux Captor is a class six psion. They'll need to assemble a team with another class six for his plant, so it is in fact practical for him to be the first we rescue. Or one of the first, at least."

Oh, hell. The implications of that sink in and you frown hard. "Are you going to be okay? I mean, I know you say you don't give a damn about your descendants or the project in general, but - it's going to be a little different in person. This whole situation is shitty for you, I know, but this is a particularly fucked up flavor of shitty."

"Honestly, at this point I've been so traumatized I'm not sure it's possible to be _more_ traumatized. My pan is literally broken. You can't break it any further."

"I'll be there," you say. "The whole time, I'll be there."

"No, you will not." His voice comes out sharp, a whipcrack, and you arch your eyebrows.

"Is this some kind of hoofbeastshit thing about putting me in danger? Because I get wanting to keep me safe, but also fuck you and your condescending comments."

"I know I can't stop you from doing what you want to do. But I think it would be... better. For you. You threw up just hearing about the plants. I don't think it's a good idea to go to one yourself, or to watch the security footage for that matter."

"I can stomach it."

"You shouldn't have to."

"I'm not weak."

"Repeatedly exposing yourself to this kind of stimuli just to prove your strength does not make you strong. It makes you a masochist, and an idiot besides." He hesitates. "And - my reasoning is selfish as well. If I'm wrong and I am capable of further trauma, and this upsets me, then I'm going to need a moirail. I do not want to put you in that position, but I'm going to need a moirail. I cannot be effectively pale for you and you cannot be effectively pale for me if we're both trying to process the same trauma simultaneously."

"Oh." You take a moment to digest that. "Okay. That's fair."

"That's not to say you can't see the trolls in recovery, assuming there are survivors. I believe you could make yourself very useful there. But you should not be involved in the initial extractions. And - I know you think I'm a cynic, and I am, to a point. But I do not want you to get your hopes up, for your own sake. Even if we find him, and even if he lives, which are astronomical odds to begin with... Sollux will not be as he was. You should accept that right now."

"I've accepted it."

He snorts. "No, you haven't."

"Fine. I will accept it. When I have to."

"By then it will be too late and you'll be very upset."

"Oh my god. Here's the thing. I'm very upset all the time. Literally no matter what, at any given moment, I'm functioning on some level of 'very upset' about something or other. That's not going to stop no matter how much I prepare myself. And here I thought you were learning things about me."

"It was worth a try." He stops outside his block. "Do you have anything scheduled now, or would you like to come in?"

"I think I should go touch base with Feferi and Terezi and make sure I didn't say anything that's going to burn the galaxy down."

"Oh, I think you set a few fires. But good ones. If they're angry about what you did, they're the exact establishment puppets they claim to hate."

"You were listening?"

"I like listening to you speak. I like it even more when you're going off in a righteous fury." He ruffles your hair. "If there is an afterlife, and Signless and the Condesce are sharing it, I guarantee you he's mooning her and flipping double birds right now. He's so fucking smug."

"Well, good. Someone should be."

He bends down to kiss your forehead. "I love you very much, little one," he says. Your stomach flips. "Go talk to the Empress. Don't ditch your security detail."

"Okay. When I'm done, though" - you stand on tiptoes, pulling his head down to kiss his cheek - "I'm going to come back here and pile you."

The tips of his ears turn faintly gold. "Duly noted," he says, and gives you a mocking salute as he steps inside.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a conclusion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> deleted and reuploaded because i super duper fucked up the formatting because i forgot to finish coding the pesterlogs oops  
> BUT ANYWAY  
> FINISHES A MULTICHAPTER FIC, THROWS CONFETTI  
> this series isn't over and i have no idea when it will be But I Finished A Fic
> 
>  
> 
> _you'll find a rooftop to sing from_  
>  _or find a hallway to dance_  
>  _you don't need no edge to cling from_  
>  _your heart is there, it's in your hands_  
>  _i know it seems like forever_  
>  _i know it seems like an age_  
>  _but one day this will be over_  
>  _i swear it's not so far away_  
>  _-various storms and saints, florence and the machine_

They find Sollux.

He's trapped in a tiny planetary mining colony that you've never heard of. The planet itself is full of untapped fossil fuels, which your species doesn't actually need, but why leave them alone when you could harvest them instead? After all, it's not like some small planet in the middle of nowhere needs to be stable. Condesce logic in action.

It's a bit of a relief, honestly, because it means that you can start the experiments with new power systems in a place that won't be devastated if they go wrong. It's not an integral colony. As long as the trolls are evacuated from the mineshafts before you fiddle with the grids, there shouldn't be any casualties. Besides possibly the trolls you're saving, but you aren't going to think about that. Nope!

Psii all but locks you in his block to keep you from following him to the plant. You pace around the entrance to the ship - if the colony blacks out, you'll need to get power to communicate from somewhere - and spam Fef's comms to pass the time. Nothing like writing a few thousand words of poetic capslocked gray text to ease your mind.

You do approximately nothing constructive save composing the beautiful poetic capslocked gray text, even though you have about a billion emails to sift through, a stack of paperwork to look over, and six different direct messages about everything from the psion project to the court systems to the latest hot meme. The list of things you could be doing is two miles long. You pick "walk in circles around the entrance hall for eight hours" out of sheer agitation.

Aradia is the one to message you an update, just when you're considering going to get a nap. Fef contacted her as soon as she had Sollux's location pinpointed. She was on the colony before you even arrived.

AA: he's alive  
CG: WHAT?  
CG: NO, SCRATCH THAT, I'M NOT A FUCKING IDIOT, I KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS  
CG: HE'S ALIVE? IS HE OKAY?  
CG: IS HE LUCID?

The pause between messages takes too long, especially considering the number of times \--apocalypseArisen is typing!-- shows up on your screen and then disappears.

AA: he's upset  
CG: UPSET.  
CG: WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?  
AA: i can't talk very much right now  
AA: the empress and i need to stay with him  
AA: but the helmsman has done more than enough for the night  
AA: feferi kicked him out so he should be there soon  
CG: OK BUT  
CG: IS HE OKAY?  
AA: the helmsman or sollux?  
CG: SOLLUX. FUCKING HELL.  
AA: like i said  
AA: he's upset  
CG: THAT TELLS ME LITERALLY NOTHING.  
AA: i'm sorry karkat  
AA: i don't know what to say  
AA: and i need to get back to him  
AA: talk to your moirail

That is the least reassuring conversation you've ever had in your life.

You break into a run as soon as you see Psii approaching the ship, all but headbutting him as you grab hold of him around the waist. He stumbles slightly before managing to realign his center of gravity, smoothing his hands over your back.

"Aradia messaged me," you say. "What the fuck is going on."

Psii runs his hands over your shoulders. "What did she say?"

"She said Sollux was alive and upset. She wouldn't say anything else."

"Well, that about sums it up."

"Elaborate."

"I will. Let's go back to the ship." He disentangles himself from you with some difficulty, because you don't want to let go, your fingers clenched around the fabric of his suit.

"Elaborate _now_."

"Absolutely not. I'm getting you into a pile before I say anything."

"Fuck you! Making me wait is not helping the anxiety!"

"Telling you here will not help your anxiety either." He takes your upper arm and steers you bodily back toward the ship. "You are going to lay down and then we will talk."

"Is he okay?"

"No."

"Okay, but will he be okay?"

He keeps walking, his mouth pressed into a thin line. "If I could give you the answers you want, I would tell you here."

"Is he going to die?"

"No."

"The monosyllabic answers are freaking me the fuck out. Are you okay? Are you - fuck, are you okay, was it okay, are you..."

"Hush."

You go quiet.

You stay quiet until he locks your respiteblock door and nudges you down into your pile, and then you immediately wrap your arms around him and start babbling again. "Okay, but are you okay, because if you aren't we can talk about it but also I need to know what happened with Sollux, can I see him, how long is Feferi going to be with him, can I stay with..."

"Shh." Psii settles down next to you and presses your face into his chest. "Shh. Calm down."

"Don't fucking tell me to calm down!"

He makes this rumbling sound that is absurdly soothing - not quite a purr, but close enough. You shut your eyes and press your face deeper into his chest, inhaling the scent of sweat and oil and barely-controlled static.

"The medics took off my dampeners while we were working, since for this project I'm useless without my psionics. It was strange. I'm starting to get used to ignoring them."

"Did you have control over them? Your psionics?"

"Did you hear any emergency sirens or receive any messages about me ripping anyone to shreds?"

"Fair."

"Sollux was the seventh psion we freed," he says. "The first three were completely unresponsive. Disentangling them from their confinement was complicated. They'd been sustained on nutrition from the bioware itself, and breathing oxygenated liquid instead of air, and had been hooked into the bioware with no regard for extraction, so - the medicullers needed to be careful when they were pulling them out."

The tone is clinical, even for him, but once he's relayed that he goes quiet. You give him two solid minutes to start again, and then nudge your horns under his chin. "The others?"

"The fourth... was dead. The medicullers think he was thrashing. The bioware restrained him too tightly in the pod. We had to cut through the tendrils to get to the body and identify it." He breathes out quietly against your hair. "It was good that you didn't come. You wouldn't have taken it well."

"I'm not taking it well. The fifth, and the sixth?"

"The fifth died five minutes after being extracted. The Empress cried."

"Fuck."

"The sixth had had some kind of malfunction with their integration. One of their hands had burned off in a controlled psionic blast. But they were also the only one capable of responding to questions verbally. Not fully lucid, but much more likely to recover than any of the others."

"And Sollux?"

"Sollux is - was - dying."

You sit up straight, accidentally knocking him under the jaw with a horn in your haste. "You said he wasn't going to die. Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, oh god..."

"He isn't going to die. I'm sorry. I misspoke. He was dying. He's not dying anymore. Lay down."

"What happened?" you ask, not even remotely close to laying down.

"At first he wasn't responding, like the first three. As soon as we'd unhooked him from the pod and gotten the fluid out of his lungs, he woke up with a vengeance. Tore a hole clean through the wall before I got him under control, so I suppose it was good that I was there. No one was harmed. It could have been worse."

"Oh my god. Why?"

Psii hooks his arms around your waist and eases you back into the pile. You're too dizzy to fight him, so you lay your head on a blanket instead.

"He didn't know what he was doing. He didn't understand what was happening. He's spent sweeps in a sensory deprivation chamber. Even under the influence of soporifics, the introduction of any new stimuli would have been torture, let alone pulling him back into the world all at once." He shudders. "I tried to tell them. I tried to tell them culling was better."

"But he's..." You hate the plaintive edge to your voice, you hate sounding like you're begging for something he can't give, you hate feeling like a naive child holding out for the happy ending. "He's okay now? He's not going to die?"

"He had a heart attack. The Empress healed him."

"A heart attack."

"Yes. She healed him, and healed him again when he had a second heart attack, and by then the medicullers were able to sedate and stabilize him."

"But... okay, but how did he survive two heart attacks if the medicullers weren't even..."

"Karkat. She _healed him_."

Oh.

_Oh._

"Are you - oh, fuck, are you..."

"No," he says simply. "But my problems can wait. You need to hear about Sollux's condition."

You scoot up and nose against his cheek. "Okay."

"When I left, he was conscious, but in psionic dampeners and dosed on heavy painkillers. Which I believe is an inadvisable idea given his current fragility, but I suppose he won't die given that the Empress is there." His mouth twists. "He was very upset. Incoherent. He didn't respond to his name or any of the questions he was asked, but the medics aren't sure if that's because he doesn't know who he is or because his pan isn't processing sensory input properly yet."

He plays with the hair curled around your horns. "He seemed to recognize Megido, if you can accept a loose interpretation of 'recognize'," he says. "He didn't actively respond to her name or her voice, but he only relaxed when she was close."

"That's..." Your throat sticks. "That's a good thing, right? That he recognizes her?"

"Possibly."

"Possibly? What the fuck does possibly mean? It either is or it isn't."

"It's more likely instinct than anything. They've been pale in the past, so he associates her presence with safety. The medics think it's... not promising that he didn't respond to her voice."

"Not promising meaning?"

"Manage your expectations."

You drop your head and moan into the side of his neck.

"I'm very sorry."

"I need to see him," you say. "I need to see him, he might recognize me, you're all probably being too pitying and I bet I could get him to respond, I bet I could - I need to see him."

That's how it always works in movies, isn't it? Usually it involves a quadrantmate but they fix someone, someone driven to the brink by chucklevoodoos or sick or with amnesia, they just need to hear a familiar voice and you can do that, you can fix this, you can fix this. You can fix this.

"Not right now, little one," Psii says.

"But - "

"He's in bad shape. You're more likely to overwhelm him than help. Wait for him to adjust." He rubs his thumb over your cheek. "And... I need you here. Please."

You frown, choking down your own worry until you can focus on what he said earlier. Your fingers ghost over his cheek, his lips, the bridge of his nose, and you let out a soft purr of your own in the hopes of calming him. The little crease between his eyebrows smooths out, so you purr louder, pressing your chests together so he can feel the quiet rumbles.

"Feferi healed Sollux?"

"Yes," he says. You keep rumbling, curling up around him as well as you can. "Before you say anything, I am aware this is a deeply irrational thing to be upset about. And I know she isn't the Condesce. Those sorts of reassurances won't help."

"I don't think it's irrational."

"Borderline comatose psions? Fine. Mummified psions? Fine. Dead psions? Fine. Untreated amputee psions? Fine. Psions having their lives saved? No, that's where my pan draws the line."

"There's more to it than that and you know it." You kiss his forehead. "Tell me what went through your mind?"

"I was..." Psii stares at the ceiling instead of at you, but he keeps speaking, softer now. "I was thinking about the number of times I went into cardiac arrest or aged until I couldn't breathe or came close to a burnout, the number of times I thought it might be over - it never was. I loved her more every time she brought me back. Every time she told me how much she needed me, I - she was pathetic, and I hated her, but I loved her. I adored her because the alternative was to dissolve into an insanity I couldn't bear. I loved her because I needed the insanity I could survive instead of the one I couldn't. And she - the Empress - your Empress - she breathed life back into his lungs and all I could think was, 'Gods, gods above, please don't let this happen again.'"

You catch your breath. That's the most honest he's ever been with you, the most vulnerable - he might as well have rolled onto his back and bared his throat, because that's the kind of infomation that can be used to gut him where it hurts most, the kind of information he refuses to share out of principle, and you -

He _trusts_ you. A surge of longing so fierce you nearly choke rears up, pulls you down, protective instincts and righteous fury and pity all warring for dominant space, and it's so unabashedly, unapologetically pale that you want to scream. The kind of pale that binds, the kind of pale that drives moirails to raze battlefields to nothing screaming the names of their loved ones, the kind of pale that people write epic poetry about.

You groan and rub your face against his.

"You are wafting some very telling pale pheromones in my direction," he says, with just a hint of dry amusement.

"I hate her," you tell him fervently. "I hate her, I hate her, she's _dead_ and I fucking hate her, I want to go back in time and peel the skin from her FUCKING bones..."

"Mmm." His body shakes. For a second you think he's crying, but then you realize he's laughing instead, helplessly, trying to stifle it. "I like this side of you more than I should."

"Fuck you, I _hate_ her!" you wail, and he draws the blankets tighter around you and peppers your face with the tiniest of pale kisses.

\---

Psii got better after he was rescued.

This is the thought you cling to as everyone involved stubbornly keeps you out of Sollux's hospital block. Psii got better. He might have been happier left in the column, he might have struggled less if he'd been culled, but you don't know, and you'll never know. Those things didn't happen. What's important is that he got better. He's not fully healed by a long shot, and you don't think he'll ever be, but he hasn't mixed you up with your ancestor in weeks and he's learning his way around computers and he's talking about his thoughts and he laughs at least once each night, even if half those laughs are sad.

When you compare that to how he was when he first left the helm - confused at best and agitated at worst, rarely lucid, trying to graft himself back into the ship, losing track of time, forgetting he'd been rescued entirely when he looked at the stars - you think there has to be hope. You'll accept there's no hope when Sollux is dead and no earlier. So you wilt with relief at the updates Psii brings you, and he frowns like you're the most pitiful thing in the world and gathers you up in his arms and breathes into your hair.

A week in, Sollux responds to Aradia's voice. It's not much. It's an ear twitch, a head tilt, repeated a few times to be sure it isn't a fluke. Psii tells you he's probably just getting used to her presence because she won't leave his side. You tell him to go fuck himself and let you have this.

Two weeks in, he responds to Feferi's name. Another twitch, another head tilt. He only responds twice before the painkillers knock him the fuck out.

"I need to fucking see him, I can't keep getting all this by proxy," you say, and Psii just shakes his head. You go to the room anyway and the guards posted outside won't even open the door, because you've been blocked entry under Imperial order from Her Imperious Reformation.

It's a goddamn conspiracy. You're going to shit a brick.

Three weeks in, he talks. It's not anything particularly mindblowing. He tells his attending medic, "Water," because apparently he's thirsty, but by the time they've returned with a glass to try to help him swallow, he's asleep again.

Terezi shows up not long after that, striding into the hospital like a divine harbinger of retribution. She, at least, messages you directly.

GC: SO 4NYW4Y, H3'S 4 M3SS  
GC: H3 GOT UPS3T 4S SOON 4S H3 S4W M3 4ND ST4RT3D B4BBL1NG  
GC: 1T W4S H4RD TO M4K3 OUT 4NYTH1NG 1NT3LL1G1BL3 BUT 1 GOT TH3 1MPR3SS1ON H3 THOUGHT 1 W4S 1N D4NG3R  
GC: 1 4M F41RLY C3RT41N H3 H4S NO 1D34 WH3R3 H3 1S OR WH4T'S H4PP3N1NG  
CG: WELL, HAS ANYBODY FUCKING TOLD HIM?  
CG: OR ARE WE ALL PLAYING THE "AHAHA SOLLUX CLEARLY CAN'T UNDERSTAND US SO LET'S POKE AND PROD AT HIM FOR NO REASON WHATSOEVER AND EXPLAIN NOTHING BECAUSE CONFUSING AND AGITATING THE GUY WE JUST PULLED OUT OF *LITERAL HELL* IS HILARIOUS" GAME?  
GC: K4RK4T!  
GC: 4R4D14 1S TH3R3, FOR FUCK'S S4K3 G1V3 H3R SOM3 CR3D1T  
GC: YOU 4R3 NOT TH3 ONLY ON3 WHO C4R3S 4BOUT H1M  
CG: . . .  
CG: SORRY.  
CG: NOT BEING ABLE TO SEE HIM IS DRIVING ME UP THE FUCKING WALL. ANY WORD ON WHEN THAT BAN'S BEING LIFTED?  
GC: P3RSON4LLY 1 TH1NK YOU M4Y 4S W3LL S33 H1M  
GC: TH3 G3N3R4L CONC3RN 1S TH4T YOU'LL VOM1T 1NTO H1S MOUTH 4ND H3 W1LL D13  
CG: I VOMIT INTO PEOPLE'S MOUTHS ON A NIGHTLY BASIS.  
CG: THEY SEEM TO BE GETTING BY JUST FINE.  
GC: PO1NT V4NT4S!  
GC: BUUUUT  
GC: 1F YOU 4SK M3 YOUR MO1R41L 1S B3H4V1NG ODDLY 4BOUT TH1S WHOL3 TH1NG  
GC: SO M4YB3 YOU SHOULD T4LK TO H1M

CG: I'M PROBABLY GOING TO HAVE A FIGHT WITH PSII LATER TONIGHT, BUT I JUST WANTED TO LET YOU KNOW THAT I'M GOING TO SEE SOLLUX TOMORROW, AND IF I'M BARRED ENTRY FROM THE ROOM THEN I'M GOING TO CALL A PRESS CONFERENCE ABOUT IT.  
CG: AND WE ALL KNOW HOW EFFECTIVE MY PRESS CONFERENCES ARE.  
CC: 38O  
CC: S)(----E-------ES)(, Karcrab!  
CC: FIN, I will lift the ban.  
CC: But be prepared, ocray?  
CC: It isean't pretty.

With that settled, you turn your attention to the mountain of other distractions you have, until Psii returns from the plant.

"I'm going to see Sollux tomorrow," you say, before he's even had a chance to take off his jacket.

He blinks. For a moment you think he's on the verge of quiet acquiescence, and this won't turn into a huge conflict at all, but then he says, "I think that would be unwise."

"Fuck you, I don't care."

As he watches you, you can practically see the gears turning behind his eyes, gauging whether this is a fight he can win. He comes up empty.

"All right," he says. "That's your prerogative."

"Why are you trying to keep me from him in the first place?"

"I just do not want you to be upset." He peels his gloves off, dropping them on the floor beside the door.

"Like I'm not upset having to take all my information secondhand and knowing that he's right within my reach and I'm not even allowed to go to him? Like that isn't fucking upsetting? You know I need to see him so why are you...?"

Psii frowns the miserable little frown he gets when he's on the verge of a downswing, and you feel like you've been kicked in the stomach by a hoofbeast at the knowledge that you put it there, but this is a conversation you have to have. This is a conversation you have to have. You're not the bad guy here, are you?

"I like what we have here," he says with a small shrug.

You deflate a little. "Are you - are you fucking _jealous_ of him? He already has a moirail, shit for pan, in case you'd forgotten. And I'm pale for you, not him."

"No. I'm not jealous. I don't expect to be the only person you pity."

"But I don't..."

He holds up a hand. "It would not be a problem if you did."

"Then what the fuck?!"

You can hear Psii's throat click from across the room. "I like what we have here," he repeats more slowly. "And I have several perigrees left before I'm truly free. And Sollux's condition is my fault."

"You... oh. No, oh my god, no, seeing him isn't going to make me _break up with you_ , how do you even jump to that conclusion?"

"I know it's selfish on every conceivable level. But maybe if I can delay you seeing the effects for yourself, I can make this last longer."

You clench your fists. "Fuck you. You don't get to be that kind of selfish. Not with me, not about this."

He nods, his mouth pressed into a tight, pained line. "You will visit him tomorrow. That's your right. I'm sorry. It was wrong of me to do this."

"I'm not going to break up with you, holy fucking shit. Remember how pissed I got at you for lying to me? This is the same principle. As soon as you stop looking like you were kicked in the teeth I'm going to be fucking furious. You can't just screw with my life because you're scared of the future. You could maybe, uh, _talk_ to me about it, like you're supposed to in a functional moirallegiance. How is it that you're worse at catastrophizing than I am?"

Another shrug. "I have a lot of room to think when I'm working. It's better to focus on my thoughts than on the tasks I'm completing. And I find myself kept up in the day less by the things I've seen over the past few weeks, and more by the look on your face when you found out I turned him in." Psii's breath leaves him in a rush and whooshes back in with a shuddering, pained gasp. "I know this relationship has an expiration date, but I was hoping it could last until the sweep was out."

"You were planning to keep me away from Sollux for a whole sweep?"

"No. No, I - I don't know what I was planning. I just thought - thought it would be easier."

You rub a hand over your face. "You're a disaster."

"I know."

"A mess."

"I know."

"The most pitiful fucking wreck I've ever seen."

"Karkat, I..." he says, but his voice chokes off, and you close the space between you and let him sob into your shoulder.

\---

Sollux is also a disaster.

He honest to fuck looks like a corpse when you enter the hospital room. If he was asleep, you'd probably start screaming for a crash cart immediately, but luckily for you he's awake and sitting up. "Sitting up" meaning propped against a mountain of white white stark white pillows.

There's oxygen drizzling into his nostrils, hooked over his ears and leading to a tank at the side of the bed. A tray full of heavy duty sopor patches and medical equipment. A few more tubes that disappear under the blankets, one that vanishes into his arm. He's thinner than you've ever seen him, pale and sallow in a way that makes him nearly unrecognizable. Every breath he takes sounds like a rattling chorus of razor blades, and you hate the dull opacity of his eyes even though you know that's due to the psionic dampeners rather than illness.

Aradia has a book propped open on his lap. When you look closer, you can see it's all pictures, simple and cartoonish.

You can't stand the thought that he might not hear you if you talk directly to him. "...What are you two doing?" you ask instead.

Aradia looks up and smiles at you. "Linguistics schoolfeeding," she says. "To help remember language connections."

Sollux's ear flicks. He swivels his head toward you, his brow furrowed in concentration, like you're a mirage and he's trying to find the flaw. You do your best to keep your posture relaxed, preparing for the worst. He's probably going to start screaming and need help from the medics and Aradia's going to have to pap him and he's not even going to recognize you, or he is and he's going to flip the fuck out like he did with Terezi, and it's going to be all your fault and -

The unblinking way he's staring at you is a little unnerving. "Uh," you say, clearing your throat. "I feel like this is turning out way more awkward than it has to be. Like I mean, I'm restraining myself from flinging myself on you and bursting into tears since I've been warned by more than one person that that's not really helpful, but you're probably pissed that I haven't dropped by yet, and you might hate me, or you might actually not even know who I am and not give a fuck, so..."

"KK," Sollux says.

Your heart stops as suddenly as your ramble. You very, very nearly fling yourself on him and burst into tears.

It is with supreme self control that you say, "Yeah. It's me."

He turns his head, levels an uncertain gaze at Aradia. "Is this real?" he asks, which makes you want to cry for a whole other reason.

"Sure is." She pats his hand. "Karkat Vantas, in the flesh."

He turns back to you, silent for half of a very long minute. "You're alive," he says finally. His voice, too, sounds like it's been dragged over a blade, but it's his voice, it's his voice, it's _him._

"Oh my fucking god. Everyone here must be suffering from pan-sweeping nookrot. No one thought to mention that? I mean, I know you and I never fucked ourselves into any quadrants but I figured we were good enough friends for someone to at _least_ mention my name to you. You know, just as an aside. 'Anyway, Karkat's not dead, and neither is anybody else worth being alive. The world doesn't suck nearly as much as it did when you disappeared. Welcome to your new hell.'"

You're talking too much. You realize as soon as you stop. You might as well be speaking a foreign language. He's frowning as he tries to process it all. Fuck.

"Okay, fuck, none of that matters. Yes. I'm alive."

Sollux narrows his eyes. "Don't," he says.

"Don't what?"

"Don't look. At me. Like that. I don't... like it."

"Look at you like what?"

"Like I'm... broken. I'm not. Fuck off."

Those are, without a doubt, the most reassuring seven words you've ever heard in your entire life.

"So you remember me?"

Sollux folds his hands in his lap, twisting his fingers together. You think he's decided to ignore you, but then he raises you a tender middle digit salute. He has to hold his other fingers down with his hand to keep his fist steady, but the sentiment is not muddied.

You fling yourself on him and burst into tears.


End file.
